Gossamer

ISBN-13: 9780385734165
Publisher: Random House Childrens Books
Published: January 2008
154 pgs


We are such stuff
As dreams are made on;
and our little life
Is rounded with a sleep.

~ William Shakespeare,
The Tempest, act 4, scene 1

You know, I have often wonder about dreams. What are they? And why do we have them? A scientific view reveals that dreams are sequence images, sounds and feelings experienced while sleeping, strongly associated with rapid eye movement sleep. In Gossamer, Lois Lowry tells her story about dream-givers and how dreams are casted upon humans (or even animals) by them.

These dream-givers have the ability of dissolving and what they do is they gather memories, colours, words once spoken, hints of scents and any tiniest fragments of forgotten sound through touching. They collect pieces of the present and the past; and with these things they create dreams to people who need a good and happy dream.

However, not all people received pleasant dreams as there are the dark and fearsome creatures known as the Sinisteeds that plague their victims with nightmares.

Now there is a little new dream-giver called Littlest One who is slowly learning her job of bestowing dreams. Together with her mentor, Thin Elderly, they visit an old woman's house each night to gather fragments and memories about her. The old woman has a dog named Toby and she is also looking after a troubled boy who is staying with her temporarily. John is a very unhappy boy because he has an abusive father and a mother who is frightened of him but still struggles to put life together.

When John came into the old woman's house, he is always angry and rude but the old woman is kind and always patient. When John became the victim of the Sinisteeds, the old woman will come to him and comfort him whenever he has nightmares. Now Littlest One, with the assistance from Thin Elderly, will have to try their best to gather all the happy things to bestow pleasant dreams to John before the Sinisteeds beat them to it.

Gossamer is a quick and entertaining read, and one that leaves a warm feeling in my heart after I closed the book and with the story still lingers in my mind. Littlest One is one extraordinary dream-giver. Though young and inexperienced, she already possess the quality of compassion and what most impressed me is her positive attitude and her interest in learning. I especially loved her insights on the sad parts of life:

“... I get a lot of sad fragments from photograph of the soldier - feelings of never-coming-back feelings of now I'm-all-alone. But the kiss is there, too, in that photograph, so I always collect there, just to keep that kiss fragment for her. And you know what, Thin Elderly? Sad parts are important. If I ever get to train a new young dream-giver, that's one of the things I'll teach: that you must include the sad parts, because they are part of the story, and they have to be part of the dreams.”

It is so true. Who said the sad parts have to be all bad? Sometimes, we have to have some sad parts in our life to remind us and be appreciative of the good ones we have.

Can you tell that I really enjoyed reading this story? I seriously do. I can not wait to read more Lois Lowry books in future.

PS: Alice, thank you so much for sending this book to me! I really appreciate it!

Other blog reviews:
Back to Books
Becky's Book Reviews
Hello, My Name is Alice
Stuff as Dreams Are Made On
The Hidden Side of a Leaf
Things Mean a Lot
(Let me know if I've missed yours.)

The Orange Girl

ISBN-13: 9780753819920
Publisher: Phoenix
Published: 2005
151 pgs
Translator: James Anderson



Georg Reed does not really know his father, after all he died when little Georg was four. Now after eleven years, Georg discovers a letter addressing to him. Intrigued by the mystery and wanting to know more about his father, Georg began reading his letter, which comes in the form of a story.

The opening of the letter is intriguing enough, for Georg's father wrote the letter the way he knew he was going to die and would be read by Georg in the future. Georg is captivated by his father's story and about the Orange Girl, a girl whom his father met on a tram when he was just nineteen. He named her the Orange Girl because she was seen carrying a bag full of oranges, but he made a fool of himself of the girl while trying to save her bag of oranges when they threatened to fall off from the bag. Georg's father could not forget the Orange Girl from then onwards, and he tried to find her again by chance on several occasions. He succeeded, and their friendship began.

There is much intrigue and mystery surrounding the Orange Girl when I began to read about this story. It is a love story between the Orange Girl and Georg's father (the identity of the Orange Girl remains a mystery until it struck me who she is towards the middle of the story). Besides love, it is also a book about kinship, as Georg's father communicated his feelings and thoughts through a long letter after he had passed away. He told his story about how he had met the Orange Girl, and how his choice on their fairytale-like relationship had in turn started or changed everything. Besides telling Georg his story, he also had a question to Georg which I find is a thought-provoking one for all.

“Imagine that you were on the threshold of this fairytale, sometime billions of years ago when everything was created. And you were able to choose whether you wanted to be born to a life on this planet at some point. You wouldn't know when you were going to be born, nor how long you'd live for, but at any event it wouldn't be more than a few years. All you'd know was that, if you chose to come into the world at some point, you'd also have to leave it again one day and go away from everything. What would you have chosen if you'd had the chance? Would you have elected to live a short span on earth only to be wrenched away from it all, never ever to return? Or would you have said no, thank you?”

The story is written in two POVs - Georg being the narrator, and Georg's father through the letter. I really liked Jostein Gaarder's style of portraying this story in a magical way, starting from Georg's father's encounter with the Orange Girl till the end when he asked Georg the above question. I marvel at Jostein Gaarder's creativity of weaving this magical story from the ordinary, everyday's life issues without making it dull or depressing at all, no matter how close they are to reality that is. I would say it is a powerful book; one remarkable story that led me into thinking of the meaning of life and death, and how life could be appreciated even in small, simple ways. It is truly a wonderful story that will not only enthrall the younger readers but to the adults as well.