Sunday, January 29, 2012

The Laughing Dragon of Oz

The Laughing Dragon of Oz was a book written by L. Frank Baum's son Frank Joslyn Baum. With this book came some controversy. Frank J. felt that his was the natural successor to the Oz books. He tried to get "Oz" trademarked in his name and get Reilly & Lee to stop publishing the Oz books. It was his mother, who made the deal with the publishers, who had to sue him for the trademark. When The Laughing Dragon was published by Witman, Reilly & Lee sued them and the book quickly went out of print.

2 comments:

Chris Dulabone said...

The Whitman edition was actually only the first few pages. The manuscript was considerably longer than that originally, and it was a pretty bad rip-off of his father's work with the names changed. Still, I wish it could be made available to all the fans who don't believe me.

James C. Wallace II said...

I happen to acquire a 1st edition copy of this book last year. It's an odd story, to say the least.