48 Hour Reading Contest: Dreams and Nightmares


I know I’m posting these late! Somehow, this turned into the worst weekend EVER to do a reading contest, but never mind, I got through it, and it was fun to keep snatching moutfuls of story whenever I had a moment. And, for the first time, I got to read a graphic novel! Neil Gaiman’s Sandman: The Dream Hunters was unexpectedly not like a comic book, but a deeply involved and stylishly illustrated novel in its own right, beginning with a strange story about a badger and a fox, who, seeing the coming winter, try to drive a monk out of his temple in a variety of interesting and menacingways (which backfire on them most amusingly). From an almost fable-like beginning, the novel morphs into a more substantial and detailed story, which is about greed, desire and fear. In the end, the fox who once only saw him as a means to a warmer place to sleep, falls in love with the monk, and makes a desperate bid to save him from his enemies with the help of dreams. The Dream King, stylishly illustrated by Yoshikata Amano, is beautifully androgynous, dangerous looking and powerful. A convoluted tale that is too short, with pictures startling enough to keep you turning back to them over and over again.

About the author

tanita s. davis is a writer and avid reader who prefers books to most things in the world, including people. That's ...pretty much it, she's very boring and she can't even tell jokes. She is, however, the author of nine books, including Serena Says, Partly Cloudy, Go Figure, Henri Weldon, and the Coretta Scott King honored Mare's War. Look for her new MG, The Science of Friendship in 1/2024 from Katherine Tegen Books.

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