A comfort read taken up during a particularly protracted reading slump; just the type of low-stakes indulgence I needed & a pleasure to revisit. Remains in my estimation one of the strongest installments of the Oz series, the insurrection attempt by the Gnome King providing a structuring device & narrative tension that makes it feel a bit less episodic—& a bit more high stakes—than other, more rambling volumes. Bonus points for the prominent inclusion of the delightfully impudent Billina the yellow hen, probably my favorite of all the secondary Oz characters.