The Lost Princess of Oz

1917, undated probably 1980s Contemporary Books edition
L. Frank Baum
Illustrated by John R. Neill
The Lost Princess of Oz
Bought new for $3.95
Paperback with stains and loose pages
B-

This is the second time Ozma is the title character, since she's again been kidnapped, this time by Ugu the Shoemaker.  The book has a number of plotholes and inconsistencies, most importantly that Ugu has learned some facts about Oz from the "books of his ancestors."  This magic includes that Ozma is the fairy ruler of Oz, that Glinda is the most powerful sorceress and owns the Great Book of Records, that the Wizard is Glinda's student, and that there's a magic dishpan in the Yip Country.  Only the last of these facts could've been recorded in a book owned even by Ugu's father, who abandoned the now middle-aged Ugu as a boy.  Ozma has clearly not been on the throne for decades.  (As for her being a fairy, that's a relatively recent development of Baum's, and somewhat inconsistent with her being changed into a boy who aged.)  Glinda has been around for decades, but I don't think she owned the Record Book before Ozma came to the throne, because in Land she spoke of her spies gathering knowledge about the Wizard, rather than of a book that automatically recorded significant events around the world.  And obviously, the Wizard hasn't been in training that long, only since the time of the fifth book at most, since he returned to Oz in the fourth and told of his apprenticeship in the sixth.

The two maps, one of Oz and the other showing the paths of the two main search parties, again put the Winkie Country in the West and right.  The second map is spoilery, being on p. 75 and showing Ugu's castle as the final destination.  But then this isn't really a mystery we're meant to solve.  It's a rather meandering quest, better than the search for Shaggy's brother, but less gripping than Ojo's hunt for magic ingredients.

Part of the problem is that there are too many characters.  Dorothy's group includes the other two little girls (Trot and Betsy), Button-Bright, the Wizard, the Patchwork Girl, the Cowardly Lion, the Woozy, the Sawhorse, Hank, and Toto, eleven total.  The other search parties (most of whom we don't follow) consist of two to four people.  I would've cut Dorothy's group down to her (since she wears the Magic Belt), Button-Bright (since he finds the peach that Ozma's hidden in), the Patchwork Girl (since she's clever and fun), the Cowardly Lion, the Woozy, and maybe Toto, five or six total.  Toto, by the way, talks more in this book, but since he's mostly whining about losing his growl, I'm inclined to agree with the other animals that he shouldn't talk so much.  The Cowardly Lion is as insightful as ever.

Baum still hasn't found a way to distinguish Trot and particularly Betsy as unique from Dorothy.  In the illustrations, Betsy has longer hair, as she did in Rinkitink.  Baum tells us that Betsy is a year older than Dorothy, who's a year older than Trot.  He hasn't yet explained that people have stopped aging in Oz, but it's starting to be implied.  Button-Bright is younger than Ojo, and we know he's younger than Trot and Dorothy.  In Road, he seemed to be about half Dorothy's age, say 4 or 5 to her 8 or 9.  He was half a head shorter than Trot in Scarecrow.  If I remember correctly, Thompson will make Trot 9, I think in Giant Horse, so when we get to that point, I'll try to approximate the other kids' ages.

The other party we follow is the pair from Yip, Cayke the Cookie Cook (owner of the Dishpan) and the Frogman.  The latter is like the Wogglebug in that he thinks his size and education make him very wise and impressive, but he takes a humbling bath in the Truth Pond, which since its appearance in Road has gained a plaque explaining its purpose.  They're joined by two of the bears from Bear Center.  Eight years after Teddy Roosevelt left office, teddy bears are still popular enough to inspire a whole city of them.

Ugu thinks he's stolen all the magic of Oz, but he doesn't know about the Nome King's Magic Belt or the magic of the Bear King.  The Bear King can show you anything in the world, which leads to a great "infinity picture" of the united parties watching Ugu watch them watch him etc.  As for the Belt, Dorothy isn't sure how to work it, despite having used it a bit in Ozma.  She reveals that she's been practicing with it, a time when Baum should show not tell.  She finds that the Belt will only grant one wish a day by closing her right eye and wiggling her "left toe" (which one?), restrictions that did not exist in Ozma or Emerald City, and then she manages to perform at least three wishes in quick succession.

This book could definitely have used some revision, but it's still better than Road, with an actual villain and plot, and more interesting places to visit.  Of these, the City of Thi is probably best, with the diamond-shaped people who eat thistles, ride around in very slow auto-chariots pulled by dragons, and obey the man who's secretly their king.  There's an odd picture on p. 165 of the giants of Herku, all of whom are bearded and fierce, except for one clean-shaven, vain-looking man.  I suspect this was a caricature of someone Neill knew.

This is my 200th post (not counting the introduction), so let's see how things stack up since Vanity Fair. The breakdown was then
1 F
2 F+s
2 D-s
3 D's
7 D+s
6 C-s
12 C's
21 C+s
16 B-s
19 B's
9 B+s
2 A-s

There are the same number of F's and D-s, but there's another F+, another D, and another D+.  C-s have increased to 8, C's to 15, and C+s to 37.  B-s have tripled, with 53 now!  B's have more than doubled, with 43 total.  B+s have almost tripled, to 21.  And there are three more A-s.  So it's been a good seven decades.

I've also posted more this month than any of the five since I started, thanks to lots of children's books and short stories.  I'm going to be busier for awhile, so I'll probably slow down this spring, especially as I hit Sinclair Lewis and other novelists of the 1920s and '30s.