Ate Oh Clock? Reading!

And here I am, inside of my head blank as an eggshell.

Let's see, I recently read the remaining three books in Gregory Maguire's "The Wicked Years." Yes, there are sequels to Wicked, continuing his revisionist history of Oz. (Son Of A Witch, A Lion Among Men and Out Of Oz.)

Eminently readable books, though if you were looking for clear-cut heroes and villains and acts of unalloyed evil or goodness, better look elsewhere. If the original Oz books are read as a history for children, a history written as the 19th Century ticked over to the 20th with all the cultural and sociopolitical baggage that entails, then Maguire's books should be understood as a recently-written history for grown-ups. Events unfold with the complexity and ambiguity of real history, neatly fitted around L. Frank Baum's original work.

While the books are liable to do a little overwriting of your childhood memories of magical visits to Oz, I recommend them.