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Out Of Oz (2011)

by Gregory Maguire(Favorite Author)

3.81 of 5 Votes: 3

ISBN

0060548940 (ISBN13: 9780060548940)

languge

English

genre

Paranormal Fantasy

publisher

William Morrow

series

The Wicked Years

review 1: Years after reading Wicked and Son of A Witch, I recently dedicated myself to finishing the quadrilogy, and I'm very glad I did. Out of Oz takes a while to really get going, like the other books in the series, but it's the conclusion that almost all the characters deserve. There aren't happy endings all around, but it feels in line with the way Oz has developed over the last four books, and the final ending is ambiguous enough that my mind can fill in the gaps and make things come out the way I'd like them to. It'll be a while before I reread these books, but for now, they'll hold a special place in my memory for taking something as simple as Oz and making it a much deeper world.
review 2: Gregory Maguire's Oz is a beautiful world marred by unlikable characters... more."Wicked" was a fun book. It was full of intrigue, bizarre experiments in magic, and complex character relationships all delivered on descriptive and witty prose.Every book after "Wicked" reads like a dumping ground for all of the author's world-building notes. Oz is diversely populated with numerous people groups; each having their own culture, mythology, habits, and allegiances. The character of each province is richly colored by believable history and geography. I was tempted to give this book two stars as a fictional encyclopedia of Ozian culture and history, because this is the only aspect of the book that shines.It was Maguire's obvious descriptive skill and careful effort in crafting Oz that kept me reading. Could such a lovingly created world fail to produce an interesting story? Yes, it could! A small amount of interest and tension built up at the beginning is promptly dropped, and not picked up again until the last third of the book. The main characters aren't exactly flat or underdeveloped, but their feelings and actions are disjointed and unrelatable. Frustratingly, the author has intentionally unmoored the protagonists from the motives and culture of Oz itself in order for them to fit the roles of misfit outcasts. The antagonists, who are formed by and are drivers of the history of Oz, are seemingly working to an exciting denouement. At the last moment, their actions become contradictory and baffling in order to support what I assume was meant to be a twist ending.So much opportunity lost. less

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