"Handy Mandy in Oz" is the thirty-first book in the Oz series started by L. Frank Baum. It was written by Ruth Plumly Thompson and published in 1937. The beginning of this book is extremely deceptive, but it ultimately ends up being a very charming, fast-paced Oz book.
Handy Mandy's introduction was that of a simple goat-herding girl living in a place called Mt. Mern. At first, I was wondering if this was some place in our world, but it was just a previously unseen area of Fairyland. At this point, she seems pretty normal, but an accident ends up shooting her off to the Munchkin area of Oz. Here we learn her true nature.
Handy Mandy has seven arms. All her arms are different too. She has leather arms, iron arms, and two regular ones. It's actually a little weird and sickening when it is first revealed, but you do get used to it. In fact, I ended up liking her a lot by the end of the story. A lot of this comes from the fact that she is super charming. She is far from perfect, but she is certainly "handy!"
She meets up with Nox the Royal Ox. He is essentially an Ox who gets to live the life of a king, but he is also more than meets the eye. One of his horns can unscrew and become a Horn of Plenty. Anything you wish for will gush out endlessly until the whole room is full of it. In fact, it becomes a major point to specifically mention how much of the thing you want or else it will just keep coming out. A town got flooded with water due to this issue.
The villain of the story was an extremely selfish wizard known as the Wizard of Wutz. He teams up with the Gnome King in another hilarious effort to conquer Oz proper. I like them both, but they are a bit too similar to one another. It was like seeing the Gnome King argue with a mirror. I still enjoyed them though!
I thought the Wizard of Wutz's idea of punishment to be just awful and tragic. He would "plant" people into big pots where only their heads would stick out of the soil and be given very little food each day to sustain themselves. It plays on the fact that no one can actually die in Oz, so torture can potentially last an eternity. Hilariously, he planned to "plant" all of his minions once he gained the throne, keeping all the power to himself. What an ass!
I recommend "Handy Mandy of Oz." It is a charming story, but far from the best that Ruth has done up to this point. I am eager to continue reading her Oz books, although I am swiftly running out of them. Only two left!
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Very interesting about Handy Mandy. She inspired an idea for an alien race in my own science fiction work. The illustrations of her I found showed her as eerily pretty-yet-strange. AS for the villains being too much alike: shallow villains tend to all be the same character. It is especially horrible of the villain to plan to betray his faithful minions. Then again, Satan himself has such plans.
ReplyDeleteWere they really inspired by Handy Mandy? I didn't know that. Did you see her picture somewhere before?
DeleteNo, but I will creating a new one. She shall seem very "human" at first only to be very otherwise.
DeleteThe Oz books are known for their eccentric characters, so this one just fits right in. You could get a lot more done with seven arms, though the extra ones would tend to be in the way. Still, it leaves you wondering what they will come up with next.
ReplyDeleteShe did get a lot done. She proved to be super useful with them.
DeleteHandy Mandy is interesting in the fact that the concept of the multiple arms of different materials is creepy. Funny that Nox's horn of plenty can be just as much a curse as it is a blessing. It's a shame the Wizard of Wutz was essentially a copy of the Gnome king, but glad you enjoyed the story.
ReplyDeleteShe's only creepy for a little bit, and then you end up liking her. It's cool!
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