Dorothy

About the Book

The day after seeing The Wizard of Oz in a movie theater, I went out and bought a copy of the book.  I devoured it in one sitting, and was convinced that as wonderful as the movie was, the book was better still.

I identified with Dorothy because both of us were orphans.  She was sent out to Kansas to live with Em and Henry, and I was adopted by a couple from Brooklyn.  And while I was always curious about who my birth parents were, I didn’t do anything about it until I was married with three children.  That’s when I jumped on the yellow brick road and embarked on a search for my birth parents.  (My story was published in the book Missing Links - The True Story of an Adoptee’s Search for his Birth parents.)

I mentioned Dorothy in my book, and subsequently used her journey in Oz as an analogy for the adoptee in search of his/her birth parents when I was invited to speak to adoption groups.

“What,” I often wondered, “ever happened to Dorothy when she grew up?  And how did she get to Kansas in the first place?”

I answered my own question in a book.  Two books, for that matter:   Dorothy - Looking for a Rainbow, a novel for young adults written in the third person covering Dorothy’s life from shortly before her birth to the day she leaves her Kansas farm and goes out to find her own yellow brick road.  And the other book, Dorothy - This Side of the Rainbow, written in the first person as a memoir covering Dorothy’s entire life.

Both books attempt to bring the character of Dorothy to life.  Both books try to create a strong female character, one who can become a role model for, not only young women, but young men as well.

The Dorothy that I created doesn’t live in Oz.  She lives in the real world during a real time in American History.  (My Dorothy was born in 1878.)  I aimed for historical accuracy.  There are many actual events and real people in both of the Dorothy stories because I wanted Dorothy to be a part of “our” history.

On one level my Dorothy stories are historical adventure stories in the tradition of Little House on the Prairie, Little Women, and Sarah, Plain and Tall.  But the two books exist on a number of different levels, too.  Both are personal search stories that unite actualization and spirituality.  Both offer a parallel between the events in Oz and their possible origin in the real world.  Both offer readers a chance to rekindle their own childhood and rediscover cherished memories of what it was like to dream.

About the Author

About Vincent Begley

Born in Manhattan, raised in Brooklyn, but reared in Seaford, Long Island, Vincent Begley showed an early interest in writing. As a sixth grader, he wrote and directed a class play on Julius Caesar. In high school he joined the staff of both the school newspaper and the yearbook. With his eye on a possible career in journalism, he started writing for The Circle, the Marist College newspaper. He also began to move out into writing other forms of fiction and drama.

As a college junior, he took advantage of the opportunity to study at Oxford University. While there he wrote a feature column for The Circle and continued to explore other areas of creative writing.

In the years since his graduation from Marist in 1970, Begley has enjoyed a writing career in a variety of endeavors from advertising to public relations. He has contributed articles to a number of newspapers, magazines and journals. His first book length work to be published was Missing Links-The true story of an adoptees search for his birth parents. Following its 1990 publication, Claycomb Press published two of his juvenile works of fiction: The Adventures of Tom Tinker and Freedom´s Light.

An Oz fan since the age of ten, Begley´s relationship with this wonderful classic was further cemented when he appeared as the Tin Man in a Marist College Children´s Theatre production of The Wizard of Oz.

In both his adoption book and as an adoption speaker, Begley compared the adoptee in search to Dorothy and her journey in Oz. Since the Dorothy character was an orphan, Begley wondered who her parents were and how did she end up on a farm in Kansas. Although he took license with the Dorothy character, understanding that she appeared in Baum´s subsequent Oz books, Begley focused on the Dorothy in the first and original story. Looking for a Rainbow, a young adult book, written in the third person, tells of Dorothy´s life up until she leaves the Gale farm. Dorothy - The Other Side of the Rainbow, written in the first person as a memoir, contains Dorothy´s complete life story. It is also available through Xlibris.

"I knew I was taking a risk by giving the Dorothy character a life out of and after Oz, because Oz purist would deny there was any other life for her than the one in the Oz series. Those purists are right. However, I don´t beleive Baum had a series in mind when he set out to tell...and later write the first Oz book. My story follows the logic of what did happen to the Dorothy in and of the first book. I wanted to take a beloved character we all grew up with, and give her further adventures, this time not in Oz, but in the real world."

Begley lives in Chester, New York with Patty, his wife of 27 years. They have four children: Jennifer, Jeremy, Nicholas and Kieran. He works in the Public Information Office at Mount Saint Mary College, Newburgh, NY, and also teaches there, as well as at Marist College.

He is currently at work on a book on eductaion, a compilation of original Christmas stories written over the last 30 years, and a book that would contain "Dorothy" stories.

Begley is indebted to the unselfish assistance of Lloyd Hedberg, Jr., who served as his gurdian angel during the editing process of Looking for a Rainbow