I had almost forgiven Gregory for ruining the original Oz characters in his interpretation… and then I got to this part. I was flipping pages and soaking it up, excited and fascinated learning about Elphaba (the to-be Wicked Witch), her parents, and her childhood.Įverything was rolling along. It was well written with the occasional obscure word thrown in. I enjoyed this part of the story very much. It starts with the Wicked Witch spying on the Cowardly Lion, the Tin Man, Dorothy, and the Scarecrow, but I had trouble suspending my disbelief long enough to accept that my beloved Oz characters would use the language the Witch accuses them of using as she eaves drops which in many ways voided the validity of the rest of the story.

The opening scene fit my assumption of the book… ish. Some of the book I really enjoyed, and other parts I REALLY didn’t, which makes it very had to assign a point value, but I’ll do my best to describe everything without spoilers. Lastly, it wasn’t even in the POV of the Wicked Witch for the entire book! Come on “the life and times of…” you would think it would be written like a biography, but no. For another, it altered the personalities of the Oz characters (bothered me very much). For one thing, it covered more time, starting before the Wicked Witch was born (didn’t bother me). I thought it was going to be The Wizard of Oz told through the point of view of the Wicked Witch. I had certain expectations for this book when I started reading it which greatly tainted my opinion when it failed to stack up. This is going to be a complicated review, so bear with me.

The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West

Wicked by gregory maguire