The Wizard of Oz

Wizard of Oz, Book 1, Special Annotated Edition

By: L. Frank Baum

Narrated by: Ron Knowles

In the The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, you join Dorothy on her first adventure in the land of Oz. After a cyclone transports Dorothy to Oz, she must seek out the great wizard in order to return to Kansas. You follow her adventures as she travels with the Scarecrow, the Tin Woodman, and the Cowardly Lion to see the Wizard of Oz then to see Glinda, the good witch.©2009 RP Audio (P)2009 RP Audio

Fantastic! My favorite edition of The Wizard of Oz

Would you listen to The Wizard of Oz again? Why?

I tried several others but this is my favorite edition of The Wizard of Oz. I liked the narrator. His voice is pleasant to listen to, and he does a terrific job with voicing the characters in the book. To me it seemed like L Frank Baum himself was reading the book.

I also liked that it is an annotated edition. The notes at the beginning of the added to the experience for me. I didn't know much of anything about Baum or the Oz books, until I listened to it. It gave me a better understanding of it all. Bravo

What other book might you compare The Wizard of Oz to and why?

It's hard to compare The Wizard of Oz to anything else except maybe Alice in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass.

What about Ron Knowles’s performance did you like?

The performance was excellent and one of the best out of all the Oz narrators. His voice is easy to listen to and he does an excellent job voicing the characters. It really did feel to me like L Frank Baum himself was reading the book.

If you were to make a film of this book, what would be the tag line be?

Dorothy could always go home, but she would have missed out on the greatest adventure of her life.

Any additional comments?

Excellent edition of an excellent story.

Prolonged prologue and lacking charm

Very disappointed. A wonderful book that stands the test of 100 years and this audio version seems to miss all of the charm and wit. I have read the Oz books to my children who love them, and bought this version for long car rides. There is a very long prologue which is largely advertising and a laundry list of Baum titles. If you try to skip it, you end up in chapter 2. Needless to say, children are uninterested and irritated by this delay in the story telling. The narrator does change voices for the characters, but lacks the warmth and cheerfulness I would have expected for this book.

If you don't Mind a highschool eassy on Frank Baum

Where does The Wizard of Oz rank among all the audiobooks you’ve listened to so far?

This books ranks pretty low honestly the Prologue drags on for way to long. It sounds like a high school student wrote it for speech class on the life and history of Frank Baum. Giving a brief synopsizes of each of the books. It's like its just trying to sell the next books without first getting you to like the book your reading just kind of assuming that you already love the book. It might have been better placed at the end to sell the next book after you find out if you like the story or the characters.

What did you like best about this story?

I bought this as a one of those books you should just have in your library as a classic. But oh my lord this book is RANDOM. If you like the Disk-world series this would be it's predecessor. Magical Land filled with odd ball stuff that only make sense because the author clams it dose and is written well enough to drag you along.

How could the performance have been better?

I didn't really like the Performance. the reading of the prologue drives me nuts, and it just seems like a father reading a child a book that he rather not be reading.

Was this a book you wanted to listen to all in one sitting?

This was a book I listened to all in one sitting as I wanted to know what the movie was based on. The complete story is much longer then the movies that its based on. the whole evil witch thing is practically just incidental thing that happens in Dorthy's Journey. Its a plot point but the story doesn't revolve around it.

Any additional comments?

I would suggest you get this (or some version of this book) just to have in your collection but its not exceptional. Its a book that's not complicated even with a bizarre world its pretty simple story that at the heart of it is a little girls journey through an odd land that is so mixed up that a timid little girl is considered a genius and great mover and shaker.

Unsatisfactory Narration

Okay, when I saw the word annotated I thought maybe there would be some sort of notes at the end of the chapters or something describing where Baum got some ideas. No. Annotated means the exact same boring introduction describing the books and the land of Oz are pasted at the beginning of each volume of the series. It's a very long introduction that you have to fast-forward through (the actual story begins about 25 minutes into the reading). I love the Oz books. And though Ron Knowles does have a wide variety of different voices for the different characters (that he sometimes misuses), he's boring. Definitely don't bother using a credit on this one...I would suggest buying them instead.