Two More Tales of Oz

The 2025 edition of Oziana, the International Wizard of Oz Club’s creative magazine, is now available for purchase through Lulu.

This issue contains two stories by me.

“The Piglets and the Tin Soldier” is another short slice-of-life tale inspired by L. Frank Baum’s Little Wizard Stories of Oz, taking a couple of his established characters and bouncing them off each other.

The Nine Tiny Piglets first appeared from the Wizard’s pockets in Dorothy and the Wizard of Oz and made small cameos in the Emerald City after that, never getting individual names. 

Captain Fyter, the Tin Soldier, marched onto the scene in The Tin Woodman of Oz. At one point in that book the heroes meet the piglets’ parents. Afterward the soldier says, “I hope I’m not too particular about my associates, but I draw the line at pigs.” So there was a natural tension to work with.

David Valentin created digital artwork of the Tin Soldier and his basket of piglets for this story of a journey through the Munchkin Country.

“The Missing Key” is a mystery featuring Snip, the button boy who was a protagonist of Ruth Plumly Thompson’s The Lost King of Oz. She introduced Snip sneaking into Mombi’s kitchen and then spying on her, establishing him as a curious kid. Several years ago, I used that trait to bring Snip into a story called “Invisible Fence.” More recently I realized that would make him a good investigator for a mystery.

In this story, Snip sets out to retrieve the wind-up key that’s vanished from Tik-Tok’s back. David Lee Ingersoll supplied the illustrations, including one of Snip pinned to the ground by string-wielding field mice, inspired by scenes in The Wonderful Wizard of Oz and Gulliver’s Travels.

Two More Oziana Short Stories

Last week’s posting about a mystery story in Oziana 2024 made me realize I’d never noted Oziana 2023, which contains two of my stories.

As I reported last week, I’ve been seeking inspiration for new stories from pairing two recurring characters in the Oz books, as L. Frank Baum did in his Little Wizard Stories of Oz.

“The Soldier with the Green Whiskers and the Guardian of the Gates” is a natural pairing: two officers of the Wizard’s Emerald City government who kept their posts under the Scarecrow and then Princess Ozma, working together as friends.

The Oziana 2023 stories, in contrast, pair characters who have little in common and start out at odds with each other.

“Button-Bright and the Professor” shows the small boy from Philadelphia and the highly educated Wogglebug quarreling over directions before they’re forced to deal with a giant riddle-loving pangolin. This story was illustrated by Marcus Mébes.

“Glinda and the Glass Cat” follows the transparent feline to the China Country, the Hammerheads, and the Fighting Trees while the powerful sorceress seeks to make her curb her willful instincts. Anna-Maria Cool supplied fun art for this tale, and for the magazine’s cover.

Like other recent issues of Oziana magazine, the 2023 collection is sold through Lulu.

A Mystery Tale from the Early Emerald City

Oziana is the International Wizard of Oz Club’s creative magazine for fiction and art inspired by the Oz books. It’s been published annually for about half a century now.

The latest issue, printed at the end of last year, includes my short story “The Soldier with the Green Whiskers and the Guardian of the Gates,” delightfully illustrated by Rob Lauer.

This story is set shortly after the end of The Wonderful Wizard of Oz. The Wizard has flown away, leaving the Emerald City under the rule of the now-brainy Scarecrow. And then the Scarecrow departed to escort his friend Dorothy to the castle of Glinda the Good. So the soldier and the guardian are the highest-ranking officials in town when Winged Monkeys start tearing a hole in the city wall.

I wrote the first version of this story when I was in junior high or high school, but was never fully satisfied with it. A few years ago I realized that it fit into a couple of trends in my newer Oz writing:

• It was a mystery, and could be a better one.
• It paired two recurring characters, a form L. Frank Baum used in his Little Wizard Stories of Oz and which I’ve been using to springboard other tales.

I wrote the story again from scratch, hopefully better. At the time I didn’t have a copy of the first version. Since then I came across an old photocopy, but I haven’t dared to read it, lest it be so much worse or even a tiny bit better.

If you care to read “The Soldier with the Green Whiskers and the Guardian of the Gates,” plus six more stories about the early history of Oz, all illustrated, and a closing poem, please order Oziana 2024 from Lulu.

Turning Ojo into Woot

A recent online discussion about the relative ages of L. Frank Baum’s young male protagonists took me back almost twenty years to when Oziana magazine published my story “Woot Meets Yoop.”

Woot the Wanderer is one of the heroes of The Tin Woodman of Oz. He hikes around Oz, looking for distraction without danger—which of course makes it easy for a storyteller to get him into danger. In this story I had him run into Mr. Yoop, the caged and carnivorous giant from The Patchwork Girl of Oz.

As I recall, this issue of Oziana was being assembled in a rush to catch up to its annual schedule, so I offered to create illustrations for the story by digitally manipulating some of John R. Neill’s illustrations.

Most of the pictures I worked with came from The Tin Woodman of Oz and showed Woot. But one I wanted to use came from The Patchwork Girl of Oz and showed that book’s young hero, Ojo. This is where Neill’s tendency to draw the children in the Oz stories with quite similar faces became an advantage.

Here’s the picture of Ojo.

My oldest edition of The Patchwork Girl of Oz has no color printing, just line art, which was easier to work with. I removed Ojo’s Munchkin ruff and drew in Woot’s more ordinary Gillikin lapels. I shortened the tails of Ojo’s jacket to approximate Woot’s and added Woot’s knapsack.

Just as important, I stretched out the boy’s legs and body a little. Removing the ruff left plenty of room for a long neck. Because as Baum wrote him, and as Neill drew him, Woot is a bit older than Ojo, further into adolescence.

Here’s the resulting picture of Woot.

I just went back and superimposed these pictures to confirm the differences. With Neill’s standard young-person face at the same level, Woot is a little taller with longer legs. A teenager instead of a boy—at least as I picture him.

Two Issues of Oziana Back to Back!

Oziana 2009 (described yesterday) and Oziana 2010 comprise a double issue, bound back to back, each with a full complement of new and original Oz fiction and art. (For folks who enjoy back covers, however, you’re out of luck.)

The theme for Oziana 2010 is “The Challenges of Governing Oz,” and it starts with Tim Art-McLaughlin’s spectacular color image of “The Queen and Her Court.” Tim is an Oz fan and professional artist from Shropshire, England; email him if you’re interested in Ozzy commissions.

Tim also provided the art for “Celebrating Ozma: The Silver Jubilee Issue,” in which the father-daughter team of Andrew and Rachel Heller introduce us to Oz’s postage stamps and postal service. They are, of course, magical.

“Fiddle’s Revenge,” by Arianna Brown, won a student writing award at last year’s International Wizard of Oz Club conference at the Arne Nixon Center in Fresno. This adventure, set back when the Scarecrow ruled the Emerald City, brings back the Cowardly Lion, the Tin Woodman, and the Winged Monkeys—as well as the danger of a giant spider. Author-illustrator Dennis Anfuso provided the suitably scary art.

In “Invisible Fence,” the Emerald City’s war against unauthorized magic takes the Wizard, the Tin Soldier, Snif the Iffin, and Dorothy to a dark Gillikin forest, where they find a most innocent-looking outlaw. This mystery story from me comes with nine charming illustrations by David Lee Ingersoll.

Copies of Oziana 2009/2010 are on their way to subscribers, and can be ordered from the Oz Club. The double issue offers two full-color covers, seven new stories, and original art at every turn.

Oziana 2009 Touches Down at Last

The issue of Oziana cover-dated 2009 is at last on its way to subscribers, and will be available for ordering from the International Wizard of Oz Club. It contains four original Oz stories, all completely illustrated.

The cover is “Lifting the Curtain,” a painting by Charnelle Pinkney, now a student in the School of Visual Arts’ program in Illustration as Visual Essay. That image symbolizes the issue’s theme of “Parodies and Alternative Views” of Oz.

In “Toto Reveals,” Dorothy’s companion shares his view of events in The Wonderful Wizard of Oz. Brianna Landon’s story won a competition for Oz writing by students in Lawrence, Kansas, a few years ago. It has charming new illustrations by Ben Wood, a picture-book artist from Australia who has illustrated books for Scholastic and other firms.

Playwright Eleanor Kennedy contributed “Barry Porter and the Sorceress of Oz,” which uses parody to explore some differences in tone between L. Frank Baum’s fantasy creation and J. K. Rowling’s. Sheena Hisiro provided stylish portraits of Glinda and a lost young wizard with a scarred forehead.

“The Ransom of Button-Bright” is Oziana’s first story in comics form, I believe. It’s a product of the hard work and good humor of artist S. P. Maldonado, working from a script by me (with plenty of inspiration from O. Henry). Who would dare to kidnap Button-Bright?

Finally, Prof. Stephen Teller’s “The Trouble with the Magic Belt” imagines a narrative fix for the Oz books—what if we simply did away with Ozma’s Magic Belt, and all the easy solutions it provides? John Mundt, Esq., illustrated this counterfactual tale with his usual verve, and provided readers with a puzzle as well.

Every copy of Oziana 2009 comes with a major bonus: Oziana 2010! More about that tomorrow.

Finding the Horror in Oz

The Wonderful Wizard of Oz has a fair number of grisly moments: the Tin Woodman chops off 41 animals' heads and kills two Kalidahs, the Scarecrow twists the necks of 40 birds, the Cowardly Lion decapitates a giant spider and offers to kill a deer for Dorothy to eat. In his later Oz books, however, L. Frank Baum moved his fairyland closer and closer to a paradise, and its potential for scary stories became more limited.

The country turned out to be protected on all sides by the Deadly Desert, made of sand that turned any flesh to dust. In The Road to Oz (1909) and The Emerald City of Oz (1910), Baum stated that people in Oz are immortal. (Earlier books had mentioned people dying.) Ozma and Glinda extended their hegemony over all of Oz, using their Magic Picture and Great Book of Records to keep track of potentially everything that goes on. In particular, they clamped down on unauthorized magic, driving away wicked witches and such. There is no want. Given that edenic situation, is it possible to write stories about Oz that are scary in any way?

Baum faced the same difficulties when he returned to the Oz series in 1913. In that year's comeback novel, The Patchwork Girl of Oz, he used several ways to jump out of the corner he had painted himself into:

• Start the story far from the Emerald City and other parts of Oz where Princess Ozma's authority holds sway.
• Give the characters a reason to hide from her, such as being involved in illegal magic.
• Use the country's abundant wilderness areas, fearsome beasts, and isolated communities.

That approach provided the model for many of Baum's subsequent books and his successors'.

But so much of horror literature involves death, either as a threat or a condition. How can storytellers exploit that force in a land of immortality?

Again, Baum created the opportunities. The same Deadly Desert that protects Oz and its immortal inhabitants can turn them into dust (presumably--we never actually see that in the series). In Daniel Gobble's "The Wailing Witch of Oz," the opening story in Oziana 2006, the spirit of a witch has lived on after her body has been thrown onto the sands. The tale's setting is thus a ghost town both literally and metaphorically. And, true to Baum's model, that town is an isolated community far from the Emerald City with a good reason to keep a low profile.

Ozian-style immortality is not without problems, furthermore. In The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, the Tin Woodman survives having all his body parts hacked off, one by one. What happened to the pieces? The Tin Woodman of Oz (1918) tells us that the tinsmith Ku-Klip has glued parts of the woodman and another man together to make a third, as shown above. But he found he had no left arm. (Yet a right arm was left, Prof. Wogglebug would remind me.)

Those missing arms hold great potential for a horror story, especially if its young protagonists:

• live deep in the Munchkin woods, far from Ozma.
• are being raised by a supplier for illegal magicians.
• must beware of Kalidahs and other beasts.

For me, the outcome was "The Axman's Arm," also in Oziana 2006.

When Oz Turned Dark

Yesterday I posted about the latest issue of Oziana, the creative magazine of the International Wizard of Oz Club, which has the label "The Haunted Issue." It features a ghost story, a poem about Dorothy's three companions' resentments, and a horror tale of children finding a live, disembodied arm. As the editorial me warns on the back cover, it may be "troubling for sensitive children--and adults."

Exploring the darker side of L. Frank Baum's Oz isn't new. Though we can see roots of such reconsideration in Philip José Farmer's A Barnstormer in Oz (1982), I think deliberately dark images of Oz first reached significant audiences through comics. Oz Squad (1991-93) featured fiery explosions and gunplay, though the good guys were still the good guys. Oz, later retitled Dark Oz and The Land of Oz (1994-99), featured war in Oz, with many of Baum's characters twisted versions of themselves.

Since then, there have been more examples from the comics world:

• the little-seen Peter Pan and the Warlords of Oz.
• Todd McFarlane's "Twisted Land of Oz" figures. (These got a publicity boost last month when the blogosphere briefly buzzed about his announcement of a new Oz project--though it's supposed to be based on a different conception.)
• Shane Kirshenblatt's Dorothy Gale: Journey to Oz.
• Scott Oliver and Corey Bechelli's There's No Place.

There are more than I can keep up with. (And I haven't even mentioned the TV series inspired by Oz in the last decade.) Check out David Lee Ingersoll's rundown.

Many of these comics are written with deep knowledge, even fondness for the Oz books (or the MGM movie), just like Gregory Maguire's Wicked. But often they seem to follow simple formulas of inversion. The Scarecrow isn't a crinkly, floppy, fun-loving, king or counselor in the royal palace, but a homicidal maniac! The Tin Woodman isn't a kind, stiff, polished gentleman, but a killing machine! The Wizard isn't a good man, though (at first) a very bad wizard; he's a very bad man!

Ah, but it's the different kinds of homicidal mania and power madness that make these comics so interesting for all Oz fans, no?

Not really. Once I suspect that the writers and artists are just trying to push my buttons, their reconceptions lose power after a couple of looks. Dorothy as an alehouse hooker? A space-age assassin? A Goth teen? Ho hum. For me, those characters are usually less interesting to watch (and less dangerous for bad rulers to meet) than Baum's little girl.

That attitude guided my thinking on "The Haunted Issue" of Oziana. Can we create stories about Oz that are thrilling and scary and, yes, DARK, but don't require distorting all of L. Frank Baum's universe and characters?

Oziana 2006 - The Haunted Issue

Oziana, the creative magazine of the International Wizard of Oz Club, features the best in new Oz short fiction, each piece fully illustrated. The latest installment, Oziana 2006, is “The Haunted Issue,” exploring dark questions of life--and death--in Oz. It may therefore be troubling for sensitive children and adults.

“The Wailing Witch of Oz” is a ghost story written by Daniel Gobble and illustrated by John Mundt, Esq. News of a death in Oz has brought Dorothy, the Wizard, and the Sawhorse to the very edge of the Gillikin Country. On the high bluffs they find a town haunted by the past, its people hiding a secret as deadly as the desert below.

“Rivals,” a biting poem by Adrian Korpel, reimagines the feelings of Dorothy’s three companions as she leaves them for the first time. David Lee Ingersoll supplied the dramatic artwork.

“The Axman’s Arm,” by J. L. Bell with drawings by David Lee Ingersoll, is a horror tale from the dark Munchkin woods. When Ku-Klip built a new man from the chopped-up body parts lying around his tinsmith’s shop, he discovered that there was no left arm. What could have happened to the left arm of a bewitched woodchopper?

On the front cover is a photograph by Peter Huoppi titled “Monkey on the Roof.” For more about the monkey in this image, see Monkeys with Wings, in particular the work of sculptor Steve Larrabee.

($5.00, 24 pages, 13,000 words. Write in order code O06 on the Oz Club order form.)

Oziana 2005 - The Countryside Issue

Oziana is the creative magazine of the International Wizard of Oz Club, featuring the best available new Oz short fiction and poetry. The magazines contain original stories and poetry, fully illustrated. Oziana 2005 was “The Countryside Issue,” offering three tales set outside the Emerald City.

In “Jinjur’s Journal,” by Loralee Petersen with drawings by Kevenn T. Smith, General Jinjur describes settling down on a dairy farm after her swift retirement as queen, as chronicled in The Marvelous Land of Oz.

Peter Schulenburg’s comic poem “The Patchwork Girl’s Pet,” illustrated by Pratt Institute graduate Sheena Hisiro, follows Scraps on a quest for a special friend.

“The Red Desert of Oz” is an exciting adventure from Nathan M. DeHoff, with artwork by John Mundt, Esq. The Scarecrow and Button-Bright’s journey through the desert kingdom of Aldehydea turns dire as they discover a plot against Glinda--and cobras that can suck the magic out of anyone, even her!

Rounding out this issue are puzzles and wraparound cover art by Kevenn T. Smith, colored by magazine art director Marcus Mébès.

($5.00, 28 pages, 10,000 words. Write in order code O05 on the Oz Club order form.)

Oziana 2004 - The Twilight Issue

For the next few days, I'll talk about Oziana, the creative magazine of the International Wizard of Oz Club. The club launched the magazine in 1971 as a way for members to share their fictional work. It thus appeared near the beginning of the “fan fiction” movement (back when this form of writing might still be called “pastiche”).

Each annual issue of Oziana features the best available new Oz short fiction and poetry. Lately the magazines contain at least three original stories, fully illustrated in black and white, and a colorful cover.

As my bio to the right says, I’m currently the editor of the magazine. So while the Oz Club website is being revamped, I’ll use this blog as a platform to promote the authors and illustrators who’ve contributed their talents to recent issues.

Oziana 2004, “The Twilight Issue,” opens with “A Bungled Kidnapping in Oz,” an award-winning story by David Hulan with lively illustrations by John Mundt, Esq. Late one night, a mysterious figure breaks into the palace and renders Princess Ozma helpless; can the Glass Cat foil this villain?

“New Moon over Oz,” illustrated by Alexi Francis, is M. A. Berg’s a glowing prose poem about how different folks in the Emerald City view the crescent moon.

“Evrob & the Nomes,” which I wrote myself, follows a young prince of Ev down into the Nome Kingdom during a period of confusion after The Emerald City of Oz.

On the cover is “The Road through Oz,” wraparound artwork by Don Marquez portraying dozens of Oz favorites. So many he provided a key to all the characters for the magazine’s last page.

($5.00, 28 pages, 13,000 words. Order code O04 on the Oz Club order form.)