September 1, 2023
Kantra branches out from her reimaginings of Little Women (Meg and Jo; Beth and Amy) with this modernization of The Wizard of Oz. Orphan Dorothy "Dee" Gale, who grew up with her Aunt Em and Uncle Henry in Kansas, is now in a graduate writing program. When her boyfriend, a faculty member, publishes a best-selling novel with Dee thinly disguised as the heroine, she finds herself in a whirlwind of gossip and makes her escape to the Emerald Isle at Trinity College Dublin. There she makes new friends: Reeti, who is struggling to tell her traditional parents that she wants to be a teacher, not just a wife; Tim, their neighbor who had a bad breakup, causing him to retreat into himself and lock out the world; and Sam, a college dropout working in his family's bodega, unable to commit to anyone or anything. Despite being intimidated by her grad school adviser, Dee grows as a writer and, in the process, realizes that she held the power to change all along. VERDICT This charming update of a classic should appeal to readers who enjoyed Curtis Sittenfeld's Eligible or Cathleen Schine's The Three Weissmanns of Westport.--Stacy Alesi
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October 15, 2023
Continuing to successfully mine the classics for inspiration, Kantra (Beth & Amy, 2021) turns this time to a charming retelling of The Wizard of Oz. After a disastrous affair with a professor in her MFA program, Dorothy Gale leaves Kansas for the Emerald Isle for a one-year program at Trinity College. Upon arriving, she learns her mentor has died after a house fell from a trailer onto her car, and Dorothy must find her footing in brand-new territory on her own. However, along the way, Dorothy encounters kind strangers who become friends and learns to rebuild the self-confidence she lost in Kansas. There are plenty of winks to the original source material--a signature pair of red cowboy boots, an advisor known as the witch, and a sister nicknamed Toto are just a few--but the story takes enough turns to keep it feeling fresh and modern. While this will be an easy sell to fans of the original, a romantic subplot and Dorothy's believable journey to find her voice also make this a strong choice for readers who appreciate uplifting relationship fiction starring appealing female characters.
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