Handy Mandy in Oz

1937, 1990 International Wizard of Oz edition
Ruth Plumly Thompson
Illustrated by John R. Neill
Handy Mandy in Oz
Original and/or purchase price unknown
Worn paperback
B-

For a change, Thompson has a female main character, with the boy prince only a minor character.  Handy Mandy is brave and funny, as well as seven-handed.  She's sort of a Swiss miss, although she lives on Mt. Mern and Neill makes her look Dutch.  Apparently, in Pirates in Oz or one of the other Thompsons I'm missing, Ruggedo was transformed into a jug, and there was a prophecy about a seven-armed Mernite being the only one who could free him.  Uh oh.  At the end of this story, he's transformed into a cactus, and no Royal Historian has disenchanted him yet.

Nox the Ox is one of the less obnoxious animal characters, and he and Mandy team up to free little Prince Kerry.  Along the way, they run into Hookers, men with hook-noses, and Topsies, spinning characters who are black with woolly hair (see Uncle Tom's Cabin).  Because, you know, it wouldn't be a Thompson book without innuendo and/or racism.  And, yes, there's Scraps-bashing, in order to make the Scarecrow look good in comparison.

As with Captain Salt, Neill is in his 1930s renaissance, sometimes using two-page illustrations and generally seeming a lot more inspired by the stories than he has in over 15 years.  There's an old-school Neill castle but there's also an action-shot of an underground "scenic railway."  If I remember correctly, his pictures in the next Oz book are gorgeous, and it helps to offset Thompson at her most racist.

Oh, and while this book still has the Munchkins in the West, Thompson has learned to spell "Gillikin."