One day a young girl, Trot, encounters a strange young boy with a big umbrella. She learns his name is Button Bright and he uses this umbrella to go on long journeys. Trot's friend, Cap'n Bill, joins the two children and they venture to a fantastical island, which they call Sky Island, as it is halfway in the sky. The island is split into two sides - the blue side and the pink side. They arrive first at the blue side - a dangerous and hostile place. The leader of the blue side, the Boolooroo of the Blues, is an evil man who punishes people by chopping them in half and sewing mismatched pieces back together. The Boolooroo captures Trot, Button, and Cap'n Bill and gives Trot as a slave to his daughters. The three eventually escape and make their way over to the pink side of the island, a much happier but still dangerous place. The laws of Sky Island insist that the visitors be thrown off the side of the island, and even the leader cannot save them. Trot, Button, and Cap'n Bill seem to be in an inescapable place of danger and they will need someone or something very powerful to save them from Sky Island.
Two children, Twinkle and Chubbins, are lost in the Great Forest when they encounter the evil tuxix. The tuxix casts a spell on Twinkle and Chubbins and turns them into little birds with their human ends. The bird-children meet Policeman Bluejay who shows them around the land of the birds and teaches them about the cruelty that can exist between humans and animals. Twinkle and Chubbins witness the cruelty of humans firsthand and find themselves in danger as well. An eagle comes to their rescue, but they quickly find themselves in danger again when the eagle's babies want to feast on Twinkle and Chubbins -- another lesson in the lives of animals that the children must learn. Policeman Bluejay takes them away to the safety of the Paradise of Birds where they witness several wonderful things, such as bees and butterflies. The King Bird of Paradise instructs Twinkle and Chubbins on how to return to their human forms, but the children walk away with a lot of lessons learned.
Young Trot and the old captain, peg-legged Cap'n Bill, might seem like odd friends, but they are constant companions and Cap'n Bill taught her to love and appreciate the ocean. Trot was especially fascinated by the idea of mermaids and talked about them often with Cap'n Bill, who warned that no one who had met a mermaid had ever lived to tell the tale. One day while out sailing around, the pair is greeted by a beautiful mermaid who extends an invitation for them to come and visit their underwater kingdom and even become mermaids themselves for the adventure. Trot and Cap'n Bill meet a wonderful variety of characters along their underwater adventure -- eels and codfish and crabs, among others. After a marvelous and exciting time with the mermaids, the only mystery left is whether or not they will be the first to live to tell the tale of meeting the mermaids!
Dorothy, an orphan lives with her Uncle Henry and Aunt Em in the bleak landscape of a Kansan farm with her little dog tot, who is her sole source of happiness. One day the farmhouse, with Dorothy and Toto inside is caught in a cyclone and deposited in a field in the Munchkin Country in The Land of Oz.
Dorothy only way home is if The Wizard of Oz who lived in The City Of Emeralds helps her find her way back. On her way to meet OZ , Dorothy is joined by a Scarecrow in search of a brain, a rusted Tin Man looking ofr a heart and the Cowardly Lion who wants courage. Together they make their journey to OZ seeking his help.
L. Frank Baum's timeless classic The Wonderful Wizard of Oz was the first uniquely American fairy tale. A combination of enchanting fantasy and piercing social commentary, this remarkable story has entertained and beguiled readers of all ages since it was first published in 1900. Ray Bradbury writes in his Introduction, "Both [Baum and Shakespeare] lived inside their heads with a mind gone wild with wanting, wishing, hoping, shaping, dreaming," and it is this same hunger that makes all of us continue to seek out the story of Oz-and be nourished by it.
This Modern Library Paperback Classic is set from the text of the definitive first edition and includes the New York Times review of that edition as well as the original Preface by the author.
From the Trade Paperback edition.
"Baum was a true educator, and those who read his Oz books are often made what they were not-imaginative,
tolerant, alert to wonders, life."-Gore Vidal
