I really wanted to like this novel. I loved Oz as a child, am always glad to see someone take it up as a subject, and a prequel, Wicked, was pretty good. This one, though, is terrible.[return][return]Liir, the main character, is so thinly drawn he seems almost disembodied, spending most of his time alone wondering who he is and what his place in the world might be. Frankly, it was almost impossible to care, particularly given irritating authorial idiosyncrasies such as Liir's incessant internal monologues concerning his feelings about situation X. Does he feel revulsion? Attraction? Or simply...self recognition? It's breathtaking how dull this becomes after a hundred pages. [return][return]The supporting characters are utterly two dimensional props intended to prompt yet another cascade of self-doubt and identity-confusion in Liir. The one character Maguire really should have fleshed out, the Quadling girl Candle, is left a complete cipher, little more than a human bandaid for Liir in his darkest hours. Later, there is a gay subplot that managed to come across as both gratuitous and drearily inevitable. Liir and his soldier friend Trism (rhymes with...) have at each other in a frigid garret above a little countryside B&B, and the next morning Liir actually complains about his sore bottom as they mount their horses. Despite the fact that Maguire creates no real emotional link between the two, and in fact Trism rejects further advances, Liir spends the rest of the novel wondering whether it might work out after all, if things with Candle go sour. You begin to think that Liir is not merely confused, but possibly not all that bright either. [return][return]There are a handful of excellent scenes, but in a way they only make the novel more disappointing by highlighting the contrast between Maguire's ability to generate atmosphere and his failure to populate his novel with interesting characters. [return][return]Finally, the story is so unresolved that the book has no legs of its own to stand on. It simply hangs forlornly between the crutches of Wicked and whatever book comes next. Unfortunately, having followed the Son of the Witch this far, the prospect of going any farther is completely unappealing.