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The land of Oz is built on strange situations and characters, but also on story. In the original "Wizard of Oz," Dorothy and her friends faced the witch, hoping to send her home. In "The Land of Oz," Pip had to deal with an entire invasion of the Emerald City. In "Ozma of Oz" there was the wonderful story of the rescue of the Royal Family of Ev.
By book four, "Dorothy and the Wizard in Oz," Baum seemed to have run out of plots and contented himself, in these few volumes, with just bringing in new characters and not bothering to craft a story around them. In book six, "The Emerald City of Oz," he took the step of placing Dorothy in Oz permanently, which was probably the best thing he'd ever done, because later volumes no longer needed to concern themselves with finding ways to get to Oz and just told really wonderful fantasy stories. ("Tik-Tok of Oz" is still my favorite in the series.")
The Oz books, in toto (no pun intended), are wonderful for people of any age, but this installment is really for completists only.
However, the book is still worth reading. For one thing it introduces the Shaggy Man, who proves to be a most enjoyable character. The Shaggy Man carries a device called the love magnet, which causes people who see it to love him. This subplot introduces a very mature and though-provoking conflict. Is it right to enchant people into loving? Is this a power that one person, even a well-intentioned one, can hold alone? What are the drawbacks of being loved by everyone? This subplot held my interest and made the story readable.
Finally, there are cameo appearances in the end from many of Baum's non-Oz books. Clearly these appearances are a plug for his other works. One cannot fault him too much for doing this though. Baum wrote many fine books which had nothing to do with Oz, and this needs to be remembered.
Despite this book's weakness, it did not signal the decline of the series. Most of the later books were quite good, and I found "The Tin Woodsman of Oz" (number 12) to be one of the best. Keep reading, as altogether there is nothing like the Oz series.
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