Tik-Tok of Oz

This, the eighth of the Oz novels, takes us into the second half of the fourteen Oz books that Baum wrote, and also is the first book to prominently feature characters or menaces from "isolated, little-known" areas of Oz, something which Baum himself made something of a necessity by his more general pronouncement of how Ozma had made Oz a near-paradise.

Queen Ann Soforth of the tiny, isolated sliver of a Kingdom called Oogaboo is weary of being a sort of play-Queen ruling over the same eighteen men, twenty-seven women, and forty-four children for eternity (here, Baum remembers and addresses to some extent the fact that being unaging means things like that ratio remain unchanging – and to some, quite boring). Being a young woman of much ambition and very limited experience (after all, she's never been out of Oogaboo!), Ann decides to take the men of her country, form an Army, and conquer Oz; she does know that Princess Ozma's army consists entirely of officers and has no weapons, so she imagines that conquering the country will be a trivial effort.

Glinda, noting this foolish project in her Book of Records, decides that even though the army would obviously fail in its object there is no reason to even allow any armed insurrection within Oz. She magically bends the path the Army of Oogaboo follows until it leads them entirely outside Oz and leaves them there to seek out whatever fortune they may find.

Ann's Army is naturally puzzled to find themselves in a rather bleak wilderness rather than the lush land of Oz, but as they have no way back, press on; they encounter a fierce and monstrous creature called a Rak, which surrounds itself with a dark cloud, but before it can attack the one fighting man of the group, Private Jo Files, fires at the only part of it that can be seen – a glowing red eye – and injures it severely enough that they can escape.

At the same time, a little girl named Betsy Bobbin is washed overboard a ship, in the company of her mule Hank. Unlike Dorothy's similar experience, this turns out to be good fortune rather than bad, as the ship she was on explodes (bad boiler?) only moments after she plunges into the waves. The two manage to climb on board some floating wreckage and are eventually washed ashore near a beautiful rose garden filled with intelligent roses. (These roses echo, both in beauty and in their rather cold demeanor, the flowers seen in Alice Through the Looking-Glass). As she is confronted by the Royal Gardener, who intends to drive her back to the sea, (no humans other than the Gardener are allowed in the Kingdom), the Shaggy Man himself plummets through the greenhouse ceiling into the midst of the confrontation.

In another scene that echoes an earlier one in another Oz book, Shaggy and Betsy decide to pick the Rose Princess who appears to be ripe in the Royal Garden, and have her command her subjects to leave the two of them alone. Unfortunately, the female roses don't want to be ruled by a woman, only a man, and the Rose Princess – a distant relative of Ozma's, whose name is Ozga – is driven out with the others.

The Shaggy Man is searching for his brother, who he believes is in the hands of the Nome King, also called the Metal Monarch and now named Ruggedo (since he forgot his original name, Roquat, in The Emerald City of Oz). Interestingly, we never learn any other name for his brother; he is always referred to as "Brother", or "Shaggy Man's Brother" or – by the Nomes – "The Ugly One".

Shortly after leaving the Rose Kingdom, the party encounters Polychrome, Daughter of the Rainbow, who's once more danced to Earth and stayed too long to get back onto the rainbow.

In a rather jarring sequence, it's obvious that Baum – and thus Shaggy Man – has forgotten that Polychrome, in her first appearance, met up with the Shaggy Man and travelled a long way with him, Button-Bright, and Dorothy in The Road to Oz. This is one of the most obvious and painful inconsistencies in the books, as there is no possible way that either Polychrome or Shaggy Man could have forgotten each other; both are far too distinctive to ever forget.

Still, Polychrome joins the group, and seems rather amused that this motley crew intends to confront Ruggedo. In this, she is very much correct; while Polychrome herself is a powerful fairy (and demonstrates it on occasion), the others are nowhere near a match for the power of the Nome King.

As they camp near a well at a crossroads, Hank the Mule notices something at the bottom of a nearby well; after some effort, the Shaggy Man pulls to the surface a massive copper man – Tik-Tok himself, who was sent by Glinda to assist Shaggy, but who had the bad fortune to encounter Ruggedo alone; the Nome King knew or suspected why Tik-Tok was there, and tossed the metal man down the well to dispose of him.

At this point, the Army of Oogaboo marches into the crossroads. At first the Army – directed by Ann – attempts to capture the group as prisoners, but the Shaggy Man exhibits the Love Magnet (which he was allowed to bring with him on his quest) to them and they are instantly converted to loyal friends. (Again, this device is one of the most insidiously creepy magical artifacts in Oz).

With the inspiration of Private Files (who falls instantly for the Rose Princess), the Princess appeals to the roadside wildflowers for help, and they indicate the direction to the Nome King's domain.

However, passing above the Nome King's domain is sufficient to alert the Nome King that there are approaching intruders, and after his spies report who the intruders are and what they are after, he orders them sent down "The Hollow Tube", despite the advice of Kaliko, his Chamberlain, who reminds him that "Tititi-Hoochoo" had warned Ruggedo of dire consequences the last time he used the Tube to dispose of intruders (as the tube apparently ends within this Tititi-Hoochoo's domain.

The path having been directed to the entrance to this Tube and the entrance made invisible, the entire party find themselves plummeting down a huge, metal-coated tube through the very center of the Earth…

Tik-Tok of Oz is certainly one of the more plot-driven of the Oz novels. While there are visits to strange locations, such visits happen as part of a greater journey focused on achieving various goals, all of which are ultimately rather personal; the Shaggy Man seeks his only living relative, Betsy and Hank need somewhere to call home, Polychrome needs to find another Rainbow (and along the way wants to help her friends), the Rose Princess needs a home as well, and the Oogaboo natives want either riches or to find their way home (or perhaps both). Against all of them is the Nome King and his armies, and the heroes eventually find themselves caught between the Nome King and the emissary of Tititi-Hoochoo (aka The Private Citizen, the Great Jinjin).

Polychrome shows herself a formidable force in this book, perhaps most clearly in the Nome King's throne room when he attempts to capture her and finds that neither he, nor any other in his realm, can so much as touch her without her allowing it. She can move at such speed that she literally cannot be followed by eye. She is the wisest and most level-headed of the main party, and it is she who knows how formidable Ruggedo is and calls for help when the others are trapped.

The "help" is something of a deus-ex-machina, but it is true that Ruggedo brought it upon himself, and the punishment of the Nome King by his distant adversary is simple; to exile above ground, driven there by the eggs he fears so much.

In the end, Ruggedo's misfortunes work a change on him; he has lived with the knowledge that all hate and despise him, but he has seen more pity and weariness than anything else from those who conquered him. He again attempts to circumvent his punishment – this time by getting a seamstress to sew him as many pockets as possible into his clothes, so that the command that he could "fill his pockets" with wealth would allow him to take a fortune, and this too backfires on him, weighing him down with so much that the pockets drag at his motions and, eventually, begin to burst.

In weariness and isolation, Ruggedo actually comes to recognize and regret his actions, and accepts his demotion; he even assists in finding a way to undo the curse of ugliness he placed on the Shaggy Man's brother.

A particularly interesting event, from the point of view of a science-fiction author, comes when the various heroes, having been victorious, must be returned to their homes. Ozma, watching through the Magic Picture, has the people of Oogaboo (plus the Rose Princess, who is clearly attached to Files) sent back home. Realizing what must have caused the disappearance of his friends, the Shaggy Man:

"… drew from his pocket a tiny instrument which he placed against his ear. Ozma… at once caught up a similar instrument from a table beside her and held it to her own ear. The two instruments recorded the same delicate vibrations of sound and formed a wireless telephone, an invention of the Wizard…"

This may be one of the first mentions of a wireless telephone – predecessor of our cell phones – in fiction, as it comes from a book published in 1914. In addition, unlike many other early depictions, this wireless telephone is explicitly described as tiny, something that one carries in a pocket with ease. It's also one of the early examples of technology crossing over with magic, something which for a while became quite rare in fiction.

For the purposes of Polychrome, this is quite an important book, as it not only features Poly herself in a strong appearance, but also shows us how Ruggedo came to be exiled (although as we will see, the way I approached this event differs especially from Baum's later work).

Overall, this is a fairly strong work, although it has some considerable "mood whiplash" at times, and it once more ends with the major problem being solved by outside powerful forces than by the specific actions of the main characters; in gaming terms, Baum has his favorite NPCs do the heavy lifting and makes the player characters stand by to admire how awesome they are.

Still, it's a reasonably good book, a strong second-tier contender, and well worth reading for a number of excellent scenes and concepts.