Christopher Lucas' Top Disney... is OUT TODAY!

I have been posting my review of Christopher Lucas' Top Disney at various book sites today. Look for it at the major book sites and bookstores. 

A Wonderful, Magic Reference Book even the Disney Sorcerers May Not Be Able to Handle!

Review by: Ron Baxley, Jr., fantasy and science fiction author, Oz author, Disney Avenue contributing writer, “Disney, Baxley, and Oz” blogger, Disney fan-fic author, reporter, and travel specialist

Five Stars (*****)

There is a “magic book” out that may baffle most Sorcerers’ Apprentices and may even baffle some of the Disney Sorcerers themselves. How this “magic book” contains so much information is truly a marvel! Top Disney: 100 Top Ten Lists of the Best of Disney, from Man to the Mouse and Beyond (Lyons Press) by author Christopher Lucas is an exhaustive, truly magical reference of lists of all things Disney from “Aladdin” to the zebras of “The Lion King” and most things before, after, and between those films themselves.

From Disney Parks to songs to obscure films and animated shorts to Disney figures notable and perhaps somewhat unknown, Lucas’ reference book runs the gamut. Fans of Disney who have been so for many decades are sure to find quite a few things they did not know before reading this book. I personally did not know some of the westerns, a few of the modern films, and even some of the CEOs and animators, for example.

By the way, Lucas does not get into some of the political or controversial aspects associated with Disney (one minor quibble I had initially was that he did not mention some of the issues surrounding a certain former CEO of the company, but this is not that kind of book). He also picks a few figures and aspects of Disney from the 90s and new millennium I might not (he does so, I think, to be representative of material from the company through many decades, not just classic Disney material). However, he handles writing the book as most excellent journalists would, without bias and to inform on a great scale. Also of note is that the publisher and he included many great visuals of posters, stills, and photographs interspersed throughout the book to aid visual learners and to make the book as digest-able as a very large Eat Me Cake.

In short (shorter than Sorcerer Apprentice Mickey this time), the Disney Sorcerers themselves will be flooded with information from this terrific tome but will find the parting of the waters has been well-completed by Lucas. And no brooms were harmed in the writing of this book or review.