Gregory Maguire

While civil war looms in Oz, Brrr—the Cowardly Lion—surrenders the story of his life to a tetchy oracle named Yackle. Abandoned as a cub, Brrr's path from infancy in the Great Gillikan Forest is no Yellow Brick Road. Seeking to redress an early mistake, he trudges through a swamp of ghosts, becomes implicated in a massacre of trolls, falls in love with a forbidding Cat princess, and avoids a jail sentence by agreeing to serve as a lackey to the war-mongering Emperor of Oz. A portrait of a would-be survivor and a panoramic glimpse of a world gone shrill with war fever, Gregory Maguire's A Lion Among Men is written with the sympathy and power that have made his books contemporary classics.

Volume Three in The Wicked Years

A Lion Among Men

"Hardly more than a kitten . . . I had thought to call it Prrr, but it shivers more often than it purrs, so I call it Brrr instead." —From Wicked Since Wicked was first published in 1995, millions of readers have discovered Gregory Maguire's fantastically encyclopedic Oz, a world filled with characters both familiar and new, darkly conceived and daringly reimagined. In the much-anticipated third volume of the Wicked Years, we return to Oz, seen now through the eyes of the Cowardly Lion—the once tiny cub defended by Elphaba in Wicked. While civil war looms in Oz, a tetchy oracle named Yackle prepares for death. Before her final hour, an enigmatic figure known as Brrr—the Cowardly Lion—arrives searching for information about Elphaba Thropp, the Wicked Witch of the West. As payment, Yackle, who hovered on the sidelines of Elphaba's life, demands some answers of her own. Brrr surrenders his story to the ailing maunt: Abandoned as a cub, his earliest memories are gluey hazes, and his path from infancy in the Great Gillikin Forest is no Yellow Brick Road. Seeking to redress an early mistake, he trudges through a swamp of ghosts, becomes implicated in a massacre of trolls, and falls in love with a forbidding Cat princess. In the wake of laws that oppress talking Animals, he avoids a jail sentence by agreeing to serve as a lackey to the war-mongering Emperor of Oz. A Lion Among Men chronicles a battle of wits hastened by the Emerald City's approaching armies. What does the Lion know of the whereabouts of the Witch's boy, Liir? What can Yackle reveal about the auguries of the Clock of the Time Dragon? And what of the Grimmerie, the magic book that vanished as quickly as Elphaba? Is destiny ever arbitrary? Can those tarnished by infamy escape their sobriquets—cowardly, wicked, brainless, criminally earnest—to claim their own histories, to live honorably within their own skins before they're skinned alive? At once a portrait of a would-be survivor and a panoramic glimpse of a world gone shrill with war fever, Gregory Maguire's new novel is written with the sympathy and power that have made his books contemporary classics.

Volume Three in the Wicked Years

Robin M Cabana

I finally finished this one only because I have an annoying need to finish everything I start. It's pretty bad. The Lion is a despicable character. Most of the story just drags. It introduces new questions about Elphaba and Liir but never answers them. The only thing I liked about it was finding out who exactly Yackle is - and she's one of the people who make no sense in the first two books.

*Minor Spoilers*

As with the first two books from the Wicked series, it was a great read. The flow of this book is a little more disjointed than the other two. I also didn't like the shifting from present to past, it was confusing as to whether the tale was being told, relived, or happening in a flashback. 

I feel like the story overall wasn't anything to get excited about, and this is more of a stepping stone to the fourth installation than a pinnacle in the series. We get caught up with how Oz is doing after the second book. He also attempts to build more cohesion between the first two books and all of the characters. Frankly I don't like that there are so many characters meeting up at different points in the story, as if all of Oz is so tiny that you will see the same people time and time again despite how far you travel. I also don't particularly understand how Brr could have been caught up to speed in society and politics so easily, especially if he was supposedly so sheltered. It seems like every person, even maunts in a freaking monastery that is secluded are able to keep up with everything that is happening in the politics and capitol. I don't buy it. Someone, somewhere should be somehow ignorant of what is happening.

Other things that bugged me included not understanding the money in Oz but being told the amounts of things (how am I supposed to know?). I also felt that some of the things involving Brr and society just didn't make sense at all. He lived for the finer things but we never really were told just how well he was doing. I think the most disappointing was that this mainly dealt with background characters, what with the "main" characters being spoken of only in passing.

Never the less, I am eventually reading the fourth book and hoping that it can redeem this series.

A Lion Among Men Volume Three in The Wicked Years

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