100 by 30: Book 25 - The Wonderful Wizard of Oz

So.....this book is super weird. It's written with the straightforward and simple tone of a children's story, but contains a lot of casual violence. The Tin Man kills a bunch of wolves and other beasts with his ax, the scarecrow murders a murder of crows, and the cowardly lion decapitates a giant spider. Another grisly detail left out of the movie is the origin of the Tin Man. He used to be a man, until his ax is bewitched and he accidently chops off his legs, then is arms, then his head, and finally he vivisects his own torso. each time, the tinsmith replaces the body part until he is completely made of tin. I can't believe they left that out of the movie! The biggest surprise for me was how little of Kansas is even in the book. The twister happens on like page 3, and the final chapter of Dorothy getting home is about 6 sentences long. The wicked witch has no Kansas counterpart, and neither to any of the other characters. We also get the death of the wicked witch about halfway through the book, without the help of Dorothy's friends. This event, along with most of the adventures, is very anticlimactic. The book follows a structure of problem, followed by a brief sense of danger, followed by a comically simple solution or Deus Ex Machina in the form of the flying monkeys, who act as a genie by committee in the books.

While the story may be simplistic, the shear amount of fantastical characters and worlds keep the story engaging. The book is also help by the amount of social commentary slipped into the pages. It is far more obvious that the characters, with the exception of Dorothy, already possess the things they think they need. The lion faces down many enemies, the scarecrow is always coming up with ideas, and the tin man cries when he steps on a bug. In the Emerald City, all of the people think they have a perfect city because the powers that be (The Wizard) have forced everyone to wear green colored glasses that they cannot take off.

While the book isn't amazing, it certainly has enough charm to make me curious to read some of the other Oz books. My favorite moment in this book is when the scarecrow is given his own private room in the Emerald city, but since he is a scarecrow and doesn't sleep, he simply stays exactly where he is placed and stares at the door until someone comes back for him the next day. It's a wonderfully silly image and if the other books have anything half as inspired, it will be well worth it.

8/10