The Patchwork Girl of Oz

The Patchwork Girl of Oz

First edition cover
Author	L. Frank Baum
Illustrator	John R. Neill
Country	United States
Language	English
Series	The Oz books
Genre	Children's novel
Publisher	Reilly & Britton
Publication date	1913
Media type	Print (hardcover)
Preceded by	The Emerald City of Oz
Followed by	Tik-Tok of Oz

The Patchwork Girl of Oz by L. Frank Baum is a children's novel, the 7th set in the Land of Oz. Characters include the Woozy, Ojo "the Unlucky", Unc Nunkie, Dr. Pipt, Scraps (the patchwork girl), and others. The book was first published on July 1, 1913, with illustrations by John R. Neill. In 1914, Baum adapted the book to film through his "Oz Film Manufacturing Company."

In the previous Oz book, The Emerald City of Oz, magic was used to isolate Oz from all outside worlds. Baum did this to end the Oz series, but was forced to restart the series with this book due to financial hardships. In the prologue, he explains how he managed to get another story about Oz, even though it is isolated from all other worlds. He explains that a child suggested he make contact with Oz with wireless telegraphy.Glinda, using her book that records everything that happens, is able to know that someone is using a telegraph to contact Oz, so she erects a telegraph tower and has the Shaggy Man, who knows how to make a telegraph reply, tell the story contained in this book to Baum.

The book was dedicated to Sumner Hamilton Britton, the young son of one of its publishers, Sumner Charles Britton of Reilly & Britton.

Ojo the very unlucky is a young Munchkin boy who, devoted to life with his uncle Unc Nunkie in the wilderness but on the verge of starvation, goes to see a neighboring "magician" and old friend of Unc, Dr. Pipt. While there they see a demonstration of the Pipt-made Powder of Life, which animates any object it touches after saying the magic words. Dr.pipt's wife has transformed an unsightly patchwork quilt into a patchwork servant and carefully prepared its brains for it to be an obedient unquestioning servant. Ojo, however, messes around with the ingredients for the brains, and the patchwork girl comes to life as a madcap, poetry-spouting, acrobatic creature. In flinging about, she knocks over a bottle of Liquid of Petrification. Unc Nunkie and Dr. Pipt's wife are thus the sufferers of the consequences of another of the Doctor's inventions, the Liquid of Petrifaction, which turns them into solid marble statues.