My attempt to read a short story every weekend continues, this time with the next one from I Didn't Quite Make It to Oz, "Over Oz" by Zoanne Leavy. This one was rejected for three reasons. The first two, that it was long and dark, we've seen before, but the third is interesting, in that the editor was familiar with Leavy's work, and therefore knew she could do better. Selina Rosen admits that, had the same story come from a writer whose work she wasn't as familiar with, it may have made the main collection. Ah, but what of the story itself? Of course, once Dorothy gets back from Az everyone thinks she's nuts, so she learns to keep it quiet as she grows up, goes to business school, and becomes a secretary. Once Aunt Em and Uncle Henry die and she inherits the farm, however, things get a little more complicated in her life. This one is probably set in the aftermath of The Movie (provided the year was 1939-ish in The Movie), as it's a lot easier for Dorothy to strike out on her own, and it just seems more modern.
And after reading all of the last book and most of this one, I can see that one of the big problems Rosen might have is that the premise is too limiting. There are only so many things a writer can do with, "Dorothy is back in Kansas and wants to go back to Oz." This may be why she got so many dark submissions about Dorothy being, or at least labelled as, crazy.
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