Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West by Gregory Maguire

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


This is my first post to the GR "blog" which I supposed I should be using as a functioning writer. I pretty much write consistent reviews for the books I read, so maybe someone will want to follow alone with what I'm reading? Just don't take my reviews too seriously, and I love discussing them, so please comment!

I first read this when I was way too young, maybe 12 or 13. A lot of it went over my head as a kid. But I had also read a lot of the original Oz books by Baum and knew a lot of the references.

Reading this is an adult, who has forgotten all of the Oz books, I am surprised by how political and broad minded Wicked really is. Like everyone else, I went to see the musical when it was on stage in my local theater in the early 2000s and we recently saw the film.

Maguire is a master world builder and his devotion to the world of Oz rivals that of GoT, Dune, and many other fantasy novels along the same lines.

There are a few group sex scenes which kind of took me by surprise. They are pretty subversive by today's standards even. I think the reason it blindsided me was because the rest of the book is so serious and political, with scathing societal satire mixed in.

I only gave it 4 stars because about 75% through the book starts to really drag. There's a lot of talking and discussion. Then the last quarter is all the action and madness with Dorothy arriving at the Witch's castle. It ends pretty abruptly after that, which also took me by surprise. But there are a lot of random time jumps throughout. And although the book is "the life and times of the WWotW", Maguire spends a lot of time with other characters. Unlike the movie and musical, Glinda takes a back seat here, with the Wizard and the Witch coming to political blows instead.

This is also a downer of a book. Nothing good happens. Everyone is pretty shitty to everyone else, is a hypocrite, or is out for their own gains. It was honestly hard to get through sometimes because it starts to beat you down. This book was "grimdark" before it became a thing in genre writing.

Nevertheless, it's still a well written book that tackles some difficult themes (good vs bad, power = responsibility, fighting the Man, etc).



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