This richly imagined novel tells the story behind The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, the book that inspired the iconic film, through the eyes of author L. Frank Baum’s intrepid wife, Maud.
“A breathtaking read that will transport you over the rainbow and into the heart of one of America’s most enduring fairy tales.”—Lisa Wingate, author of Before We Were Yours
Hollywood, 1938: As soon as she learns that M-G-M is adapting her late husband’s masterpiece for the screen, seventy-seven-year-old Maud Gage Baum sets about trying to finagle her way onto the set. Nineteen years after Frank’s passing, Maud is the only person who can help the producers stay true to the spirit of the book—because she’s the only one left who knows its secrets.
But the moment she hears Judy Garland rehearsing the first notes of “Over the Rainbow,” Maud recognizes the yearning that defined her own life story, from her youth as a suffragette’s daughter to her coming of age as one of the first women in the Ivy League, from her blossoming romance with Frank to the hardscrabble prairie years that inspired The Wonderful Wizard of Oz. Judy reminds Maud of a young girl she cared for and tried to help in South Dakota, a dreamer who never got her happy ending. Now, with the young actress under pressure from the studio as well as her ambitious stage mother, Maud resolves to protect her—the way she tried so hard to protect the real Dorothy.
The author of two New York Times bestselling nonfiction books*, The Eighty-Dollar Champion* and The Perfect Horse, Elizabeth Letts is a master at discovering and researching a rich historical story and transforming it into a page-turner. Finding Dorothy is the result of Letts’s journey into the amazing lives of Frank and Maud Baum. Written as fiction but based closely on the truth, Elizabeth Letts’s new book tells a story of love, loss, inspiration, and perseverance, set in America’s heartland.
Praise for Finding Dorothy
“In some ways reminiscent of Jerry Stahl’s excellent I, Fatty, Letts’ Finding Dorothy combines exhaustive research with expansive imagination, blending history and speculation into a seamless tapestry. . . . It’s a testament to Letts’ skill that she can capture on the page, without benefit of audio, that same emotion we have all felt sometime over the last 80 years while listening to ‘Over the Rainbow.’”—BookPage (starred review)
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Beautifully written! Audio book was amazing and I can’t wait to re-listen!!!
This book was excellent. I loved it. Filled with great facts about the author of the Wizard of Oz book series and his family. Loved his wife Maude, for whom the story focus’ and the history of her suffrage mother
Matilda Gage.
The narrator did a great job! Loved it from page one. Didn’t want it to end.
Historical fiction fans will rejoice. With meticulous research and vivid detail, Elizabeth Letts explores both Maud’s life story leading up to the writing of The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, and her determination to see that the film remained true to her husband’s vision as it was made in 1930’s Hollywood. Letts takes readers on an unflinching journey between hardship and hope, with a catch-your-breath ending.
Old Hollywood is its own kind of Oz in Finding Dorothy, complete with false dazzle and complex combinations of threat and allure. But what really satisfies here is the unlikely friendship between L. Frank Baum’s unsinkable widow, Maud, and the young Judy Garland, on the vulnerable cusp of fame. It’s an alliance that seems touched with magic and serendipity and something even more transformative, true understanding between women.
A breathtaking read that will transport you over the rainbow and into the heart of one of America’s most enduring fairy tales and the hardscrabble life that inspired it. Gripping, fascinating, Finding Dorothy is a novel for anyone who ever stared in awe as Oz came to life onscreen, and wondered what other secrets lay hidden behind the curtain. A dream of a book you’ll want to savor and share!
Anyone who ever loved The Wizard of Oz (book or movie or both!) will find something to love in this dual story of the early life of the wife of L. Frank Baum and her connection with Judy Garland during the making of the movie years after her husband’s death. Maud is a wonderful character (with a fascinating mother) and this was pure reading pleasure for me!
My 2019 year of reading is off to a wonderful start partly because of this wonderful book! This is such an original story that I couldn’t wait to start reading and I was not disappointed. I worried that my love of The Wizard of Oz movie would influence how I liked the book but if anything it improved my experience because when Maud, our main character, is talking about the making of the movie and the scenes that were being filmed, I could remember each and every one of them.
From the blurb you know that this novel is written from the point of view of Maud Gage Baum, wife of L. Frank Baum, the author of The Wizard of Oz. There are two time frames, one starting in the 1870’s when Maud and Frank are young, married, very poor and raising their family of four boys. The other time frame takes place during the taping of the movie around 1939.
Maud was the daughter of a Matilda Baum a leading voice for women’s rights, Susan B Anthony and Elizabeth Stanton were frequent visitors in their home. Matilda wanted her daughter to be independent, well educated and have a life of her own continuing to carry out her mother’s work for women’s rights. When Maud was introduced to Frank by her college roommate they quickly fell in love. Matilda was so upset with Maud marrying a “theater man” (actor) that she never spoke to her again after their marriage.
Maud and Frank started their marriage living in Dakota starting various start up businesses that never seemed to take off. One, a fantastical sounding children’s toy store, was said to contain just about any toy that a child could wish for. The store did well for some time but when the town fell on hard times Frank was forced to sell the store and go to work as a salesman. Maud took in sewing to keep a home for the boys and food on the table.
During this time she tried to help her sister Julia who had married a hard headed and perhaps abusive husband. She lived quite far away but they did visit occasionally and Maud was in love her with little niece, who is quite probably Frank’s inspiration for Dorothy, right down to the blue gingham dress that Maud sewed for her. Throughout all of their hard times Frank always found ways to make things “magical” for his children with his wit and imaginative play interactions.
The second time line takes place during the filming of the movie where Maud tries to keep the leaders of MGM to keep true to her husband’s story. She befriends Judy Garland whom she quickly sees is being treated terribly. Her mother along with the director keep Judy on diet pills so that she won’t grow out of the part since she is reaching puberty. She is also encouraged to smoke cigarettes to tame her hunger and was even slapped in the face when she couldn’t stop laughing in a part of the filming. I already knew where this beginning addiction let the singer/actress and was ashamed that it was her mother who encouraged this behavior.
I did feel a connection to Maud, I liked her ability to always find “the silver lining” and make the most of what the family had to stay happy. Later I loved her strength and tenacity to try to help Judy through the tough times during filming. It was interesting learning so many things about the original Wizard of Oz. Frank never wanted anything to scare children in his books and there was no wicked witch in his story. Oz was supposed to be a wonderland that children could escape to when things were sad or difficult for them. Of note is the fact that the studio almost cut Over the Rainbow because they thought it was too long! There is much to discover in this book.
I encourage everyone to read this book and if by chance you have never watched the movie, please do so, it is a treasured movie icon.
I received an ARC of this novel from the publishers through NetGalley. The book is set to publish February 12, 2019.
Such an interesting, unique tale! I thoroughly enjoyed Finding Dorothy. It was an easy read, with a few very hard scenes, especially related to Maud’s sister Julia’s unhappy life on the homestead. *Shudder.* This novel brought L. Frank Baum and his wife Maud to life, along with the tumultuous times in which they lived. I always love learning “the story behind the story” and this was exceptionally satisfying in that regard. According to the author’s note at the end, most of the novel was based on historical fact of record. I enjoyed meeting Judy Garland (poor girl!!) and the wink from Clark Gable, but the real stars of this show were definitely Frank and Maud. If you have any interest at all in The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, I think you’d enjoy this book.
We all know the story of Dorothy following the yellow brick road to find home. We’ve all seen the movie since childhood, and watched as she fights the wicked witch to earn the right to finally go home. (If you haven’t seen the movie – where have you been??). But do you know the story behind the story? Do you know what prompted L. Frank Baum to write about Dorothy and Toto and all her fairytale friends? That is where the historical fiction novel, Finding Dorothy by Elizabeth Letts steps in.
As L. Frank Baum’s widow arrives at MGM to oversee the making of the 1939 classic “The Wizard of Oz”, we begin to see how important it is to her to make sure the story is done correctly. And she also brings with her the backstory of the writing of this children’s classic. Elizabeth Letts weaves a wonderful story within a story of the life of L. Frank Baum and his wife, Maud, and all their struggles through the early years until his success as a writer. On the movie set, Maud feels protective of the young actress, Judy Garland, who plays Dorothy and watches over her. She also feels protective of the character too, wanting the studio to portray Dorothy exactly as she is in the books. In-between her visits to the set, we see flashbacks of Maud’s youth through her marriage to Baum and beyond.
I can’t tell you how much I loved this story. It gave depth to character who I’d loved as a child and an adult and gave even more meaning to the story. The author states that she put as much truth in the story as she could find, and you can see the work she’s put into it. It’s an amazing historical fiction novel that I am sure you will enjoy.
A woman with a heart, a brain, courage to spare, and a girl’s sense of wonder—this is the heroine of Elizabeth Letts’s sparkling, touching novel. Maud Baum is the daughter of a suffragette and the wife of a dreamer, but she is also a force to be reckoned with in her own right.
Beautifully researched and written, Finding Dorothy pulls back the curtain on a fascinating relationship behind the making of The Wizard of Oz.
Did you ever stop and wonder how the Wizard of Oz came to be or the life behind the author? Finding Dorthy is a wonderful book from the point of view of Maude Baum the wife of Frank Baum. I read it all in one day. I couldn’t put it down.
I loved this book! I grew up watching The Wizard of Oz each year starting in the 1950s. I was so surprised to see how the producers change from black and white to color when Dorothy lands in Oz. Elizabeth Letts’ story about Maud, the author Frank Baum’s widow. Twenty years after his death, she goes to MGM where they are filming the Wizard of Oz in 1938 and befriends Judy Garland. We are treated to flashbacks of Maud’s childhood and later her time with Frank. I laughed and cried while reading this wonderful book.Thank you NetGalley for an ARC of this book in exchange for an honest review.
This book was not the book that I was expecting but it was so much better than I thought it would be. I was mildly interested to read it when I won a copy – I mean who doesn’t love the Wizard of Oz movie, play, books but I wasn’t sure how a book about the Wizard of Oz would be interesting. Ok. I was wrong. This book is about more than that – it’s a story about L Frank Baum’s wife Maud. It takes place in two time periods – 1871 through 1919 – Maud’s years growing up until the death of her husband Frank. The second time period is 1938 when The Wizard of Oz movie was being made in Hollywood. Maud is the daughter of one of the leading women in the suffragette movement of the day and is even related to Susan B. Anthony. Her mother is insistent that she go to college so that she doesn’t need to rely on a husband but when Maud meets Frank, their love makes her leave college and follow him around the country as he presents plays. Their life together is not easy as Frank tries to find his place in the world but once he starts writing, he has found his goal. The other part of the novel in 1938 involves Maud getting involved with the making of the movie so that she can protect the story that her husband had written. She meets and feels protective about Judy Garland who at the time was very young and very controlled by her stage mother.
I thought that Maud was an extremely well written character and I loved how strong willed she was. I had no idea how closely the characters in the book followed their real lives until I read the author’s comments at the end of the book. I was also able to find a picture of Maud Baum with Judy Garland during the filming of the movie when I goggled her.
So – bottom line – if you ever watched The Wizard of Oz movie or read the books – this is going to be an enjoyable book for you. If not – and I can’t imagine too many people who haven’t seen the movie – if you enjoy interesting and well written historical fiction, this is the book for you. I enjoyed and won’t soon forget Maud Baum.
Thanks to librarything for a copy of this book to read and review. All opinions are my own.
4.5/5
Loved this part fiction/part nonfiction tale of how and why L. Frank Baum wrote his enduring masterpiece, “The Wonderful Wizard of Oz”, told from his wife Maud’s perspective as she watches the 1939 film being made. There’s Hollywood history here as well, some surprises, some heartbreaks. I found this very interesting, moving and informative. Definitely recommend.
The author did a great job with informational fiction. Wonderful book!
I love, love, loved this book! The author’s painstaking research completely brought to life the real people who inspired, created, and were in various ways were connected to both the original book and the movie based on The Wonderful Wizard of Oz.
What a marvelous story this was!! Letts has done a fabulous job crafting a backstory for Dorothy that is as magical as Oz itself. The writing is lovely and a great blend of fact and fiction. I was not aware that L. Frank Baum’s wife was the daughter of Mathilda Gage and the elements of the story that discussed the women’s movement and suffrage battles were some of my favorites. I did find the ending a little rushed – all of a sudden the first Oz book is published and things fast – forward and wrap themselves up tidily… It was an odd way to resolve the story, which was so wonderfully descriptive and detailed up to that point. Still, if that’s my only “complaint”, be aware it’s a minor one – this is a gorgeous book full of surprises and heartache and moments of brilliance – like Oz itself!
What a wonderful, touching story!
What a great chance to learn more about L. Frank Baum and the making of ‘The Wizard of Oz’!! A very interesting behind-the-scenes book. I found it interesting to read about Frank’s imagination and the process of writing the Oz’ books. I enjoyed reading about Mrs. Baum and her attempts to keep the movie faithful to Frank’s vision. Along the way you learn about their life together. Fascinating and interesting and delightful!