So, I’m a huge fan of The Wizard of Oz. I’ve been watching the movie since I was a kid. I’ve seen it countless times and I even own the soundtrack release from 1995 which included extended versions of many of the songs as well as a missing song (The Jitterbug) recorded but not included in the movie.
Around 2001 I checked out from the library the original Oz novel (above) by L Frank Baum and read it. And loved it. I even watched Dreamer of Oz, the TV movie starring John Ritter as L Frank Baum. Then, sometime around 2005-2006 I received the annotated edition of The Wonderful Wizard of Oz (see below). It’s a gorgeous hardbound book with all the original illustrations as well as a 100 page biography of L Frank Baum as well as very meticulous notations throughout the text of the story bringing into focus the impact this book had on society.
A year later I made the resolution that I was going to read all of the original Baum Oz novels. There are 14 of them. I even acquired the first three books from Paperbackswap.com in a bundled collection by Books of Wonder (also in the photo above). However, that goal was somewhat forgotten and I haven’t done anything about it. Until now.
I mentioned on the Nerd Lunch podcast recently (twice already) that in 2012, I’m picking this resolution back up and I’m going to finish the Oz novels. And to keep myself accountable, I’m going to blog about it. So a new feature is being created called Following the Yellow Brick Road which will chart my progress with each book. I’ll do reviews of each book as well as any ancillary material appropriate to that book. For instance, for the first three books there are Marvel comic adaptations as well as the original 1939 movie and the 1985 sequel, Return to Oz (which is an amalgam of books 2 and 3). I may throw in quick mini-reviews of that stuff as well.
So, in 2012, join the Cavalcade of Awesome through the Kansas twister into the enchanted land of Oz. I’m thoroughly looking forward to it.
Cavalcade of Awesome 