Ozma of Oz by the Toronto Civic Light Opera Company

 The Civic Light Opera is back with one more Oz story, the third Oz book, Ozma of Oz, which they have decided will be their final entry. They've released (and I've reviewed) The Wonderful Wizard of Oz and The Marvelous Land of Oz, so to avoid being an Oz company for a long time, they're concluding with Ozma and going on to other stories.

The CLO is sticking with MP3CD to distribute their audiobooks. These are CDs that have MP3 files on them as a data track, allowing for a lot more audio than you'd get from a standard audio track on a CD. Modern CD players can play these, and you can also play them back in a computer with a disc drive or use it to copy the files to a portable device. Or you can do what I did and put it in a home theater DVD or Blu-Ray player, pull up the folder of MP3 files and just start playing.

Ozma of Oz goes back to the Outside World (our world), where we find Dorothy and Uncle Henry on a trip to Australia on a stormy night. While looking around for Uncle Henry, Dorothy goes on deck, only to be washed overboard, finding refuge in a chicken coop. She awakens outside of the Land of Ev with Billina, a talking chicken. On their way to find out the best course of action, they meet the mechanical man Tik-Tok, and Princess Langwidere who has thirty interchangeable heads in her boudoir. But soon Dorothy and her companions fall in with the visiting princess Ozma of Oz, who's heading to the nearby Nome Kingdom to rescue the Royal Family of Ev from the Nome King.

If you're familiar with my previous reviews, you'll know what to expect. While the text is unabridged, the introductions and chapter titles are not read. Joe Cascone narrates with a full cast performing the dialogue, the cast returning from their roles in the previous two audiobooks.

To make it further stand out, classical music and sound effects are added. This is where I have to mention one thing. During the story, both Langwidere and the Nome King use bells to call for their subordinates or to be alerted. The same sound effect is used for all times, which is fine, it's just that this sound effect is very familiar if you've ever seen a commercial for Taco Bell.

Audio quality is good. I was playing it back with the audio going through the soundbar and found it sounded best if I used the music setting.

Overall, it's a great presentation of the story.

Again, we get a matching presentation in a jewel case, decorated with artwork by John R. Neill, photos of the cast, an introductory note from Joe, a cast list and a list of music used in the production. If you miss physical media, these are worth looking over.

To get a copy, Joe has it for sale on his website, along with the first two Oz books as well as music CDs and notices of his upcoming audio versions of A Christmas Carol and Animal Farm.