After the big tornado, Dorothy goes missing for days. She finally turns up and of course recounts her visit to Oz. The towns people who are very religious don't believe her tales and think she might have murdered an elderly lady from town instead of "The Wicked Witch". They sentence her to an insane asylum. Everyone wants to know if she is insane or not. I wasn't the biggest fan of this book. I was looking for a unique take on the Wizard of Oz but I didn't like all the religious hysteria.

Thank you to the author, publisher, and NetGalley for allowing me to read this ARC of ‘After Oz’. What an awesome idea for a novel. I love The Wizard of oz and I think this was such an awesome and interesting, slight dark, take on the story. I love opening up the idea of what happened after Dorothy comes back and has this totally outlandish story to tell. Definitely a lot of Bible verses scattered throughout the story, but! I suppose it makes sense to show how deep the townsfolk are in their religious beliefs and how that plays a part in Dorothy coming back.

I didn't enjoy this one as much as I thought I would. It was a bit slow for me and it took a lot for me to stick to it. The premise was good, just didn't capture me.

This was a really amazing imagining of the whole Oz story. Pulls you in like a twister and shakes up what you think you know about it. Poor little Dorothy who is at the mercy of a stupid religious community. A lot of women’s issues that remind me of what is going on right now and how we have to fight to be heard.

Although I enjoyed the story, it seemed to drag out a bit with the writing style. The characters were well thought out, and the twist in the story was good.
Thanks for allowing me to read and review!

Five stars!!! Read this book!!

Thanks to NetGalley and Crooked Lane Books for the ARC in exchange for my honest review.

I absolutely devoured this book in one sitting. The mystery was unraveled at the perfect pace and I loved the extension of one of my favorite stories, The Wizard of Oz. This is a realistic look at what it would have actually been like in the small Kansas town struck by a tornado in the late 1800's and an 11-year old girl who tells a larger-than-life story.
 
Just as in the original source material, when the tornado hits, Dorothy Gale goes missing for four days, but in this book, we don't follow her to Oz. We stay in Kansas with her family and community desperately looking for her. When she is finally found, she tells a fantastical story about her time in Oz, where, though she didn't want to, she was forced to melt the wicked witch to save her friends. Everyone thinks she is completely off her rocker, and they send her to live with the town pastor who might be able to dispel these "devilish" imaginings. However, a few days later, a woman who is not well liked in town is discovered murdered in her home, and the townspeople start to suspect that Dorothy may have fabricated her story of Oz to cover up the fact that she killed the woman.

This one was so much fun! The twister has come. Dorothy was missing for days and turns up uninjured with a FANTASTIC story that’s not well received by this very small, Christian prairie town in Kansas. When Alvina Clough is found murdered, all suspicion goes to Dorothy. After all, she admitted to melting a witch! After she is sent to an asylum, a “lady doctor” comes to help. Sent by her reporter cousin, Frank Baum.

If you love the Wizard of Oz, you’ll love this story! So down to earth!

who dunnit for adults--what happened when Dorothy returned to Kansas. Not for children. Good twist at the end.

This was a nice quick read, and I honestly really appreciated that more than one would think.
I felt the mystery was there. The characters were very interesting. I really wanted more of Dorothy though, that would be my biggest gripe.
My favorite was the different POVs, that just added to the excitement for me.. The only other thing I didn't enjoy was the end. It seemed far out there, and I was hoping for something else.

Thank you to NetGalley and Crooked Lane Books for an eARC copy of After Oz by Gordon McAlpine.

Gordon McAlpine writes the familiar story of Dorothy and her journey to the magical land of Oz which takes on a haunting new twist. Set against the backdrop of 19th-century Kansas, the novel opens with the aftermath of a devastating tornado that destroys the Gale family farm, leaving young Dorothy missing and presumed dead. However, when Dorothy reappears unharmed days later, her account of her time away plunges her into a nightmare of disbelief and suspicion.

This aspect of 'After Oz' is one that I really enjoyed. After all, the original novel and movie do not give any insight into how the Gale family, the farm hands etc., felt during Dorothy's disappearance with the exception that she was missed and they were worried. So it made perfect sense that the residents of Sunbonnet would meet her fantastical tale with fear and condemnation, not to mention the accusations of witchcraft and murder which Dorothy is also entangled with. It also makes sense that Dorothy would be sent to the Topeka Insane Asylum. Gordon McAlpine does a good job in making the real world accurate for the time the Wizard of Oz was set in, not to mention that it doesn't 100% focus on Dorothy as we've already heard her side of the story on many occasions.

Dr. Evelyn Grace Wilford, was not my favorite character to say the least. While she was better than the doctors at the Topeka Insane Asylum, the way that she used her experience was not 100% accurate for what was used in MA (I mean tarot cards, really?) and she got herself way over her head in Sunbonnet. Which is pretty typical for any story based in a small town and the trope is over used, but that isn't Gordon McAlpine's fault. The ending also had a lot left to be desired due to some plot holes that really should have been answered, but I won't ruin it for those who wish to finish the novel.

I will say that I did enjoy the novel, McAlpine writes a compelling novel that explores prejudice, madness, and the lengths we will go to uncover the truth. It will certainly linger for some.

I think this is a wonderfully dark twist on a classic story! It was always a wonder what the townspeople thought of Dorothy when she came back and spouted all of this "nonsense" about killing a witch to save a fairy land and now we have a better idea of it. Real page turner.

As someone who works in the mental health field, I was very interested in this re-telling from the synopsis. Overall, the author’s writing style was easy to read and allowed you to follow along the story easily. I really liked the plot of this book, but would have liked more dialogue that pushed the plot forward and less from the narrator. Pretty good read. Not my favorite, but worth a read.

I really wanted to like After Oz by Gordon McAlpine, but it left me feeling flat.

Mr. McAlpine gives Dorothy’s journey to Oz a new spin, and the concept is interesting and has potential. However, the writing itself felt more like a young adult’s attempt at re-writing a classic. I found Dorothy’s dialogue unmatching of the personality the author tries to describe the girl as having. It was as if he was trying too hard to make Dorothy sound like she belonged in an insane asylum rather than just an imaginative young lady. Speaking of dialogue, the language between characters doesn’t quite reflect the time period the story supposedly took place during, either.

Some elements of the story line make me think perhaps Mr. McAlpine was trying to write a Midwest, late Victorian era version of The Scarlet Letter. But this, too, was unsuccessful.

I am rating this story 3 stars because the idea had potential, but I don’t believe it was carried out as well as it could have been .

I was really excited about the premise of this book but I was left wanting more when I finished it. I think it's because I wanted more investigation into Dorothy's retelling of her trip to Oz, how did she come up with the details, where was she really? The mystery of the old crone was a good twist but it was more a of traditional "who done it?" than an exploration of a well-known, and well-loved, fantasy land.

This is the tale of what happened to Dorothy after she returned from Oz. It is definitely an interesting spin on how a small, Christian community in the late 1890s reacts to a young child and her "imaginative" story of where she was after the twister hit their town.

I enjoyed the story and was not expecting a retelling of "The Wizard of Oz" as the title specifically states "After Oz". It was a fun read! 3.5 ⭐️

Thank you, NetGalley and Crooked Lane Books for the ARC.

Thank you NetGalley for a pre-release copy of After Oz. **Warning: this review contains spoilers.”


I really wanted to like this book. Unfortunately, it was really hard to follow. It’s written from several perspectives (and switches back and forth), but the narrators are never formally introduced, and there isn’t a signal when the narrator was changing. So I had to spent quite a bit of time trying to figure out what was going on, who was talking, and why.

I liked the general premise of the book. However, the ending was disappointing. Justice is never given to the real killer and Dorthy just goes on the run. It would’ve been nice to have more of a resolution.

♥️♥️Book Review♥️♥️
After Oz by #gordonmcalpine

So cool! I have had quite a few back-and-forth reviews on this. You either really love it or didn't like it. I give 3.5 stars.
Yes, it was a cool remake of #thewizardofoz... Told through the mind of a psychologist. The book entails how doctors and psychologists work in small towns back in the 1800s. In a small town, a young girl named, Dorothy says she visited the land of Oz and survived the massive tornado the town was still recovering from. She also says that she accidentally killed a witch by melting her face in the land of oz. A neighborly woman found Dorothy in her pumpkin patch a couple weeks after the tornado had passed. Dorothy was taken to the hospital right away, and kept in an insane asylum, due to the hint stories of the land of Oz. some believe that Dorothy had a hard bringing up due to living with her aunt and uncle, and not having parents others believe that Dorothy could be from hell but in all reality, could a little girl really murder someone so violently by melting their face off! A psychologist dives deep and finds out the truth. The truth shall set you free.
The ending of the story is a little drawn out, which is fine, but I felt like it could’ve ended on a sharp-witted-witted note rather than a run-on. I didn’t give this five stars because there are a lot of subjects that are overly explained in this novel. Some main like that is just not something I prefer. This is also a murder mystery, and not just fantasy. You could definitely sit down and read this in one day. Give it a try! You may love it!!!!

#netgalleyreadathon #netgalley #netgalleyreview #netgalleyreviewer #netgalleyreads #netgalleyarc #ilovebooks #ilovebooks📚 #bookrecsofinstagram #bookrecommendations #bookreader #bookreviewersofinstagram #booknerdigans #booklover #murdermystery #thriller #thrillerbooks #thrillerera

A tornado has hit the town of Sunbonnet, Kansas. 11-year-old Dorothy Gale is missing, the farm belonging to her aunt and uncle destroyed. The townspeople go looking for her but have little hope of her recovery, especially as days pass without a sign of her. When Dorothy is found in a pumpkin patch several miles away four days later, people can't help but wonder where she's been but none of them believe the story she tells.

I almost don't know what to make of this book. I feel like I need some time to think about what I read. The first thing I tried to figure out as I was reading was whether the author used the Oz books or the movie(s) as his starting point. Definitely it seems that the movies were the starting point, with both the original Wizard of Oz and the Disney sequel Return to Oz being visible behind the curtain (like how I did that?) The story also had definite overtones of the Salem witch trials, as religious zealots are prosecuting a person against whom there is no real evidence of any wrongdoing.

The perspective was very interesting, going back and forth between an anonymous townsperson who represented one side of the story and a doctor from the east coast (Massachusetts of all places) representing the other side of the story. Dorothy played very little part in the book and we only see Toto once. I found that a bit disappointing but the story wasn't really about Dorothy, it was more about the town and how they handled the situation.

To avoid spoilers I won't say anymore about what happens in the book, however I will say that there were some moments that had me gasping out loud and the ending was quite a surprise. I enjoyed this book a lot and would really like to reread it. Anyone who is a fan of the Oz stories should definitely check it out.

Thank you to the author, the publisher and NetGalley for providing me with an ARC.

Thank you for the chance of reading this arc.

I didn't love this book, but I also didn't hate it. There were aspects I really enjoyed, for example the addition of L. Frank Baum. But I did also struggle with the format.

I really looked forward to reading this book, but I didn't love it. It was not what I expected. I struggled with the way it was written and I felt like there were a lot of bible verses. I think it would have been nice to hear from Dorothy's point of view as well.