Two More Buckethead Books

There's two more books that I read after getting home from Winkies this year.

I'd actually tried to read The Flying Bus of Oz by Ruth Morris on my trip, but for some reason, I was so tired and groggy that the book made no sense to me whatsoever. However, after I got home, I tried it again in a normal state of mind and found it to be a much better read.

Prince Robin of the Ozian kingdom of the Noyzy Boyz is not interested in being a Noyzy Boy at all! His father has his magician discover what can be done. The solution involves bringing a girl named Joy Morris from the Great Outside World, so when she's picked up by the school bus one day, the bus flies away to Oz! It's up to her sister Corinne, her brothers Doug and Peter and her doll Shrinky to hop on a magic carpet and go to Oz to save her!

The story is actually a lot of fun, even though, you realize, the Morrises are actually the author's family. However, rather than making the family the special people who Oz needs, they just visit Oz and have an adventure like any other visitor in the Oz books.

Get your copy here.

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The Crocheted Cat in Oz by Hugh Pendexter III is a follow-up to Pendexter's non-Oz book Tales of the Crocheted Cat. The Wiseman from Crocheted Cat peeks in on Oz and witnesses a Wicked Golden Witch lurking around Oz as Ozma prepares to celebrate another birthday. He sends his Indian assistant boy Badger, Theobald the Crocheted Cat and Hannibal the poodle to Oz to stop her.

Arriving in Oz, the Witch spots them and turns Badger into... a badger. Hurrying to the Emerald City, they witness the Witch stealing one of Ozma's presents, then they chase her as she high-tails it to Ev!

It will take some cunning and some help from Oz (including a now-giant vulture named Yeksh), Theobald and his friend head to Ev themselves to stop the Witch once and for all!

This is a well-written book, and the pictures by Caroline G. Taber are gorgeous! Well-recommended.

Get your copy here.

Winkie Reading 2013 Part 2

Now for the rest of the books I read on my trip. There's a few others I've read since, but we'll get on them soon.

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Fwiirp in Oz: An Anthology by Nate Barlow, Jeff Barstock, Ryan Gannaway, Greg Hunter, Phyllis Ann Karr, R. K. Lionel, Marcus Mebes, Hugh Pendexter III, and Chris Dulabone. Surprisingly, this is a collection of non-Oz stories. A freak accident happens in Oz due to some living paper going to the outside world and a poorly-researched Oz story being written on it, the true Oz altering to match it! Many Oz characters wind up outside of Oz, while Fwiirp (a skeezique) and his friends find stories in the Mys-Tree of Oz and have to discover what the stories are telling them to help restore Oz as Jellia Jamb and her friends work towards the same goal.

Seemingly, the book began as Nate Barlow's Jellia Jamb of Oz and the Mys-Tree plot was added to flesh out the book. The main plot is rather thin, but the short stories are rather fine, if a few take some odd turns: a teddy bear who comes to life after being buried with his boy and a vampire who finds religion. Overall, a fun book that shows off many of the writers' strengths by letting them work outside of Oz.

Get your copy here.

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A Foolish Fable from Oz by Chris Dulabone and Marin Xiques. Going back to the time when the Wicked Witches of the East and West were still in power, two elephants from the Isle of Kenra are helped by some Orks to get to Oz to find more sugar cane. Meanwhile, the Wicked Witch of the East needs some ivory to finish a nasty spell, but someone has stolen her Silver Shoes! Can she and the Wicked Witch of the West (both sporting some very long names) recover them?

The cover shows photos of Chris and Marin goofing around with a large ceramic elephant who must have inspired the story. As you can guess, they also do not take a serious approach to this story, making for one of many of Chris and Marin's silly but fun Oz stories.

Get your copy here.

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The Haunted Castle of Oz by Marcus Mebes. A ghostly knight is spotted in the Emerald City's palace, and Dorothy and her friends investigate and discover Prince Terrence, his page Christian and a magician named Necronominus and a curse that's been placed over these three. Some surprising magic is at play here and our friends in Oz have to help save the day.

Marcus himself informed me that he isn't exactly proud of this book, but the story—though it makes rather a thin book—is very well-written. The pictures are very good as well.

Get your copy here.

Wooglet in Oz

And here's a book by Hugh Pendexter III, a guy who really knew his Oz. One of his really popular Oz works was "Oz and the Three Witches," a story set right after Dorothy and the Wizard in Oz, reconciling the two different accounts of Ozma's abduction in that book and The Marvelous Land of Oz.

That had first been published as a booklet in 1977, but Hugh's love for Oz didn't abate, and he even examined how magic worked in the Oz series. The 1990s found Hugh writing more Oz stories to be published by Buckethead Enterprises of Oz. The first was The Crocheted Cat of Oz in 1991. The book at hand, Wooglet in Oz, was published in 1993.

Wooglet, her uncle Chris (publisher Chris Dulabone), and their burro Cosmo get caught in a blizzard while camping. They get caught in a giant birds' nest, and Wooglet, a little girl who loves the Oz books, suspects they're in the Jackdaw's nest from The Marvelous Land of Oz, and begins looking around and finds the lost Wishing Pills, using one to wish them out of this.

The three find themselves on Takers' Island, full of people who are exiled from Oz because they didn't want to live under Ozma's semi-communist rule. Among them is Dr. Nikidik, who still works magic, but is limited. However, they soon realize they need to get to Oz by whatever means possible, as a fiend named Braxus is going to take Zog's evil magic supplies and use them to conquer Oz!

So, aside from Baum's Oz books, this book also draws from The Sea Fairies and The Pearl and the Pumpkin, a book W.W. Denslow illustrated. Hugh also draws many points together, trying to put the Dr. Nikidik and Dr. Pipt continuity confusion at last, and offering a different explanation for why Tip got a stomachache from a wishing pill.

While these continuity bits might stick out, the story doesn't get stuck on them and flows pretty smoothly. And the characterizations of Wooglet, Uncle Chris, and Cosmo are so well-developed, it's fun to read about them.

The book is sparsely illustrated by David St. Albarns with seven images, including the cover art. The art is well-detailed and immerses you in the story, but a result of only seven means we don't see the classic Oz characters (the last few chapters are not illustrated at all), so we can't see if the artist viewed Oz as Neill and Denslow's Oz or if he had his own ideas.

Overall, I enjoyed it!

You can get a copy here.