Dorothy Must Die by Danielle Paige

Dorothy. Must. Die.

Excuse me? Why? Well because in this story of OZ she is not sweet and kind. Dorothy made it back to OZ a second time and became a power-hungry princess who is a mean and scary dictator. Her ruby slippers are instead magical ruby spiked heels. The winged monkeys are not evil but they are enslaved by her to fly her magical carriage. She has loyal followers who enjoy evil the way that she does, there are followers who pretend to like her out of fear of punishment, and then of course there is a resistance.

I thought it would be difficult to get into Dorothy Must Die. I’ve seen the movie many times, and Dorothy and her friends are sugary sweet and like-able. Dorothy even has a face that just can’t appear evil to me. It is a testament to the skill of Danielle Paige that she could sway me to the resistance against Dorothy and friends. The tin-man has knives for fingers, the lion feasts on fear, and the scarecrow experiments on people!

Amy Gumm is a “normal” (how do we define normal?) girl who gets swept up in a tornado and lands in Oz. She recalls the story of Dorothy that we all know so she has a hard time reconciling that with what she hears from people living in OZ under her rule. “Glinda the Good” is a loyal follower of Dorothy. Glinda has enslaved munchkins to drill out magic from OZ for Dorothy’s use. Meanwhile, her Wicked twin Glamora is part of the resistance. Wicked witches like Glamora are banded together to stop Dorothy. Something that Amy is told by everyone she meets is that she should trust no one. What Amy is certain of is that Good is Wicked, Wicked is Good, and she is magically bound to the Wicked resistance and MUST kill Dorothy. Can she actually do it?

I’m hooked on this series. Thankfully I discovered this one late and all of the books have been released already.