Book Review: Dreamland by Robert L. Anderson

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Dreamland
Author: Robert L. Anderson
Reading Level: Young Adult
Genre: Fantasy
Released: September 22 2015
Review Source: HarperTeen

Odea Donahue has been able to travel through people’s dreams since she was six years old. Her mother taught her the three rules of walking: Never interfere. Never be seen. Never walk the same person’s dream more than once. Dea has never questioned her mother, not about the rules, not about the clocks or the mirrors, not about moving from place to place to be one step ahead of the unseen monsters that Dea’s mother is certain are right behind them.

Then a mysterious new boy, Connor, comes to town and Dea finally starts to feel normal. As Connor breaks down the walls that she’s had up for so long, he gets closer to learning her secret. For the first time she wonders if that’s so bad. But when Dea breaks the rules, the boundary between worlds begins to deteriorate. How can she know what’s real and what’s not?

Dea has always been extraordinary. She has never understood why she was capable of walking through other people's dreams, but she knew that she needed to do it for her health. She knows the rules, and has always been able to follow them. Until Connor comes into the picture. Dea wants to know everything about him, even if that means walking his dreams more than once and breaking the rules.

A story about a girl who can walk through others' dreams and see our deepest desires, and our hidden secrets. Immediately, it has you hooked-right? The premise for the story was hooking - the start of the story? Not so much. It took me until the nightmares came into play before I got hooked. And I believed that was Chapter 7 or so. So I was kinda far into the book before I was hooked. What kept me going was the fact that the premise had the makings of a story that would be so enticing. And I'm glad I stuck with it, because once I was hooked I couldn't stop reading.

The plot was a little predictable. I felt like certain things were handed to us before we were given the answers so that we could piece together the story. This didn't detract from anything, but that just made the twists less fun than they could have been. I would've rather been shocked when it was time for me to find out with Dea what was happening, rather than me piecing together certain things. Yea I would be shocked when I figured it out, but I would have rather found out with the character.

How the story ended I really am hoping that Anderson decides to write a sequel. Not to say it's a cliff hanger, but there is definitely enough for there to be a story following this. And I would be one of the first people in line to read it.

Seeing as this is Anderson's first novel I would say I'm impressed. Usually first novel's are hard to read - at least I feel like the first novel's of many authors are rocky and the author is trying to find their writing voice and are unsure if audiences will enjoy what they are writing. I did not feel this way with Anderson. I felt as though he knew his writing voice for years and he was confident that audiences would enjoy his stories. And from my experience, and reviews I've read of others - I believe he succeeded in giving us some great entertainment!