Gossamer by Lois Lowry (and thank you!)

Littlest One is one of the dream givers. As her name indicates, she’s still a young one, still in training. Every night, she and her mentor visit the house of an elderly lady who lives alone with her dog Toby and give her dreams. This is what the dream givers do:

“Through touching, they gather materials: memories, colors, words once spoken, hints of scent and the tiniest fragments of forgotten sound. They collect pieces of the past, of long ago and of yesterday. They combine these things carefully, creating dreams. Then they insert the dreams as the humans (and sometimes animals, for occasionally they give dreams to pets, as well) sleep.”

Their dark counterparts are the Sinisteeds, sinister creatures that inflict painful nightmares upon their victims. The Sinisteeds are attracted to the house Littlest One and Thin Elderly visit when the lady who lives there decides to look after a troubled eight year old boy, John. Brought up by an abusive father and a frightened mother, John has known little but fear, rejection and violence for his whole life. Now he’s being taken good care of for the first time, but emotionally he’s still very fragile, and he hesitates to trust even those who show him nothing but kindness.

The premise behind this story is that while good dreams strengthen the dreamers emotionally, nightmares wear them down, eventually leading to an emotional breakdown. Littlest One and Thin Elderly must fight with all their strength to free John from the influence of the Sinisteeds.

With Gossamer, Lois Lowry managed to create a story that is both sinister and warm. While not quite as masterful as The Giver, this book explores some of the same themes: memory, and the importance of having a wide emotional range, of accepting sorrow and loss as well as joy. And like in The Giver, these themes are handled well. Gossamer may not quite as subtle, but Lois Lowry knows better than to overstate her point.

I enjoyed this short novel’s eerie and slightly haunting mood. I also liked the characters, be they human, canine or of another sort altogether. Gossamer is a very short book, but one that’s likely to stay with you.

Other Blog Reviews:
Stuff as Dreams Are Made On
Becky's Book Reviews
Back to Books
Hello, My Name is Alice
The Hidden Side of a Leaf
Melody's Reading Corner
Rhinoa's Ramblings
It's All About Books

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First of all, I want to thank the lovely Eva for choosing my blog for her "You Make My Monday" Award, and for saying some the sweetest things ever about me! Thank you so much, Eva! Not only that, but she also picked two of my favourite bloggers, Chris and Carl, and said wonderful - and very true - things about them too. If you don't already follow Eva, Chris and Carl's blogs, you really should!

I also want to thank Anna and Chris for passing me the "I Love Your Blog" award. I was tempted to take the easy way out and not pass it on to anyone. As some of you have said yourselves, picking just a few favourites can be very hard. But then I decided to take this chance to highlight some great new to me blogs. By new to me, I mean discovered in the last couple of months.

So Alice, J.S. Peyton, Naida, Dar, Bart, Charley, Pardon my French and Jenny, I love your blogs and I'm very glad to have "met" you!