Strange the Dreamer Review

This week’s novel is Strange the Dreamer by Lani Taylor.

The story goes that there's a magical city of riches and knowledge in the desert.  But 200 years ago they stopped sending out caravans, and 15 years ago its name vanished from memory, replaced only with "Weep." Lazlo Strange, an orphan raised by monks and a librarian at the university library, is so obsessed with stories about Weep that that he earns the nickname "Strange the Dreamer."  Sarai, a girl who has spent her life trapped in Weep's citadel after the massacre of her family, is able to control dreams, and uses her skills to bring vengeance on the people below.  But she's starting to question if the torture is justified.  Together, they're put in an impossible situation of keeping everyone alive.

This book is gorgeous.  The prose is vivid and magical, and I was sucked in from the first page.  The characters were complex, as no one was purely good or evil to the point where I sympathized for everyone even as their actions were reprehensible.

I was also impressed with how the reveals were handled.  I knew what the twists would be before they were explained, and I was on the verge of disappointment.  But every time, it turned out that the explanation--or what I hesitate to call a twist--was not the shocking part, but the way it was revealed was where the surprise came in.  There was always a measure of awe or wonder that made the reveal magical, that made it rewarding, that made it so I only knew the skeleton of what would happen ahead of time.  It was almost like Taylor knew that the reader knew the twist, and she was unconcerned with keeping her secrets, which was a great call since it allowed her to put her effort into presentation instead of obfuscation.  And the presentation was--again--gorgeous.

For example, Lazlo is in suspense about the problem Weep is facing, while the reader knows from Sarai's point of view chapters that the citadel is looming over the city as a reminder of centuries of oppression.  So when Lazlo discovers this, it is not surprising for the reader.  What is surprising is what the citadel looks like, and it is impressive and surprising enough that the reveal as Lazlo comes over the hill to see the city is delightful.

Taylor also plays with tension in a neat way.  In the prologue, a girl falls from the sky.  Eventually, as you read, you realize that this event wasn't in some distant past, but it's coming up, and I was waiting for the moment when a girl would fall from the sky.  The anticipation grows as you start to understand the enormity of the situation of a girl falling and you start to understand that the consequences are going to be catastrophic.  So whenever things start looking up, the fact that it's all going to come crashing down still looms over you.  There are scenes that would otherwise have little tension, but I was braced through them, thinking, "Ooooooh, this is it.  Someone's getting pushed off this balcony any second now."

I can't recommend this one enough.

***

Next week: All the Birds in the Sky, magic and sci-fi in an oncoming apocalypse by Charlie Jane Anders.