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Son of a Witch

By Gregory Maguire

(51)

| Others | 9780061862328

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Book Description

Years after the death of Elphaba, the Wicked Witch of the West, a young man named Liir, rumored to be Elphaba's son, is discovered in the ruins of Emerald City ...

Critics

SON OF A WITCH

Elphaba Thropp, the Wicked Witch of the West, is dead at the end of WICKED, Gregory Maguire's first Oz novel. In her later years, Elphaba traveled with Liir, a boy sent out with her when she left the Mauntery she had lived in for so long. Although sh ... (read full critics)

teenreads published on Thu, 16 Sep 2010

SON OF A WITCH

Elphaba Thropp, the Wicked Witch of the West, is dead at the end of WICKED, Gregory Maguire's first Oz novel. In her later years, Elphaba traveled with Liir, a boy sent out with her when she left the Mauntery she had lived in for so long. Although sh ... (read full critics)

teenreads published on Mon, 13 Sep 2010

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7 Reviews

1 person find this helpful

Son of a Witch

This one just didn't have the magic for me that Wicked did. Which isn't to say this isn't a good story in it's own right - just not what I was expecting.

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Readingrat said on Oct 18, 2008 about the Paperback edition | Add your feedback

1 person find this helpful

Better than the Wicked! But, I guess I still prefer the musical Wicked more!

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Corky said on Apr 13, 2008 about the Paperback edition | Add your feedback

1 person find this helpful

Although a good book, it wasn't quite up to the standards of Wicked. It took me a while to be drawn in with this book, but yet the end did leave me wanting more because there were so many questions left unanswered. It also might be better if read immediately following Wicked, which I read over a yea ... (continue)

Although a good book, it wasn't quite up to the standards of Wicked. It took me a while to be drawn in with this book, but yet the end did leave me wanting more because there were so many questions left unanswered. It also might be better if read immediately following Wicked, which I read over a year ago.

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Terror said on Apr 11, 2008 about the Paperback edition | Add your feedback

It's not an instant gripper but hang in there...

Okay so it's been awhile since I read Wicked but I found myself finding my way around Oz so much easier this time. It surprised me how easy I fell back into the author's style of writing and the whole concept of Oz. He does have a distinct way of writing and the Oz he's created is so much richer in ... (continue)

Okay so it's been awhile since I read Wicked but I found myself finding my way around Oz so much easier this time. It surprised me how easy I fell back into the author's style of writing and the whole concept of Oz. He does have a distinct way of writing and the Oz he's created is so much richer in detail than the Oz we all know that in the first book I struggled with seperating my original idea of Oz with his new one. In Son of a Witch however, it was so much easier to fall back into his world.
Liir is a weird character. He's not someone you fall instantly in love with and at times you may even find yourself hating him just a little bit. However his story is really gripping and I couldn't tear myself away for the most part. In the beginning the plot floats between Liir's past, what happened him after Elphaba died, and the mauntery where is lying in a coma. It's quite interesting to see what happened after Dorothy killed the Wicked Witch and was sent home as we never saw this at all in the original. It was nice to see the Scarecrow turned out to be a fairly nice character as they had all been portrayed as idiots in the first book, even though we only meet him for a few moments.
Back to Liir, he is really a strange person. There's some good in him definitely but we all see a lot of bad as he struggles to find a place for himself in the world of Oz. I really enjoyed the whole relationship with Candle that came near the end and I wished it had turned out a little better. Also enjoyed Trism but the gay reference confused me as I wasn't really sure where the author was going with that. Liir struggled with any human relationship he had, seeming to really only be able to interact well with Animals.
Overall the whole setting of Oz and the characters and the plot were at times mesmerising and at times lacklustre. I really am struggling to identify my feelings for this book because I loved the whole premise of the story and I definitely found myself gripped for a large portion of the book but... There were also definitely parts where I was waiting for that chapter to finish and was left wondering what the hell was that about? I think the only way to describe it is that it was an okay story with good characters in an amazing setting.

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Lauraolsthoorn said on Mar 2, 2012 about the Paperback edition | Add your feedback

I'm probably the only person on the planet that doesn't like this book. I found the main character absolutely regrettable. The only thing that redeemed this book at all was the ending. If he comes out with a sequel... I'll have to read it and hope it's better.

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Heather Landry said on Apr 27, 2010 about the Paperback edition | Add your feedback