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Ten years after the publication of Wicked, Maguire returns to the land of Oz to follow the story of Liir, the adolescent boy left hiding in the shadows of the castle when Dorothy killed the witch.
Ten years after the publication of Wicked, beloved novelist Gregory
Maguire returns at last to the land of Oz. There he introduces us to Liir,
an adolescent boy last seen hiding in the shadows of the castle after Dorothy
did in the Witch. Bruised, comatose, and left for dead in a gully, Liir is
shattered in spirit as well as in form. But he is tended at the Cloister of
Saint Glinda by the silent novice called Candle, who wills him back to life with
her musical gifts.
What dark force left Liir in this condition? Is he really Elphaba's son? He
has her broom and her cape -- but what of her powers? Can he find his supposed
half-sister, Nor, last seen in the forbidding prison, Southstairs? Can he
fulfill the last wishes of a dying princess? In an Oz that, since the Wizard's
departure, is under new and dangerous management, can Liir keep his head down
long enough to grow up?
For the countless fans who have been dazzled and entranced by Maguire's Oz,
Son
of a Witch is the rich reward they have awaited so long.
Chapter 1
The House of Saint Glinda
SO THE TALK OF RANDOM BRUTALITY
wasn't just talk. At noontime they discovered the bodies of three young women,
out on some mission of conversion that appeared to have gone awry. The novice
maunts had been strangled by their ropes of holy beads, and their faces removed.
Her nerve being shaken at last, Oatsie Manglehand now caved in
to the demands of her paying customers. She told the team drivers they'd pause
only long enough to dig some shallow graves while the horses slaked their
thirst. Then the caravan would press on across the scrubby flats known, for the
failed farmsteads abandoned here and there, as the Disappointments.
Moving by night, at least they wouldn't make a sitting target,
though they might as easily wander into trouble as sidestep it. Still, Oatsie's
party was antsy. Hunker down all night and wait for horse hoofs, spears? Too
hard on everyone. Oatsie consoled herself: If the caravan kept moving, she ...
Gregory Maguire is the author of a number of books including Confessions of an Ugly Stepsister, Lost, Mirror Mirror, and Wicked, the basis for the Tony Award–winning Broadway musical; and Leaping Beauty, a book of short stories for children. He has lectured on art and culture at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum and the DeCordova Museum as well as at conferences around the world. An occasional reviewer for the "New York Times Book Review" he lives ...
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