Open this amazing and intricate pop-up book and a tornado spins up from the first page, a blue-black whirl bearing down on a small Kansas farmhouse. On another page, a field of red poppies explodes into three dimensions. On still another page comes the majestic rise of the Emerald City. Robert Sabuda’s dazzling version of The Wonderful Wizard of Oz is hard to put down once it’s been opened. His complex pop-up creations on each two-page spread only tell part of the story, however. Each spread also features pop-ups embedded within the smaller pages of text affixed to the larger pages. Those smaller pages contain the words to L. Frank Baum’s story, although in a shortened version. But this is not a book to pick up in order to read the The Wonderful Wizard of Oz. It’s a book to pick up in order to experience that story in a new and visually stunning way. Not a volume that can withstand the heavy use seen by libraries, this is nonetheless a book to know about and enjoy in other settings. (Age 6 and older)

One of the true classics of American literature, The Wonderful Wizard of Oz has stirred the imagination of young and old alike for over four generations. Originally published in 1900, it was the first truly American fairy tale, as Baum crafted a wonderful fantasy out of such familiar items as a cornfield scarecrow, a mechanical woodman, and a humbug wizard who used old-fashioned hokum to express that universal theme, "There′s no place like home."

Follow the adventures of young Dorothy Gale and her dog, Toto, as their Kansas house is swept away by a cyclone and they find themselves in a strange land called Oz. Here she meets the Munchkins and joins the Scarecrow, Tin Woodman, and the Cowardly Lion on an unforgettable journey to the Emerald City, where lives the all-powerful Wizard of Oz.

This lavishly produced facsimile of the rare first edition contains all 24 of W.W. Denslow′s original colour plates, the colourful pictorial binding, and the 130 two-colour illustrations that help make The Wonderful Wizard of Oz so special and enduring.

Ages 9+