So, I picked up "Dreams and Shadows" after the book's marketing campaign finally wormed its way into my brain. Whenever I looked up a book I enjoyed or wanted to read, there was an ad for "Dreams and Shadows".
As a children's librarian, the majority of what I read is, well, children's novels. This is not to say they are juvenile, most are quite sophisticated. Sometimes even more sophisticated than adult novels. And that is because children, tweens, teens, young adults, whatever you may call them are not stupid. I think it was Dr. Seuss who said ,"Children can smell a moral a mile a way." If that is not a direct quote, it is close. So while people get all high and mighty with me when I read children's books and say that it would drive them mad, because they are juvenile, I argue back that most of the time a good children's author will write a better story than an adult author. Because, while a child may not be totally jaded, they are not stupid.
What does this have to do with "Dreams and Shadows"? I have been reading some adult literature lately for a number of reasons. One, I am running a 20-30 something book club at work and two, I feel like I need to be familiar with some of the more modern stuff. As I enjoy most of Neil Gaiman's writing, this one was suggested. And in a way I see how. Cargill weaves a dark fairy tale complete with some great research of fae and dark legends. Not all that "glitters" is gold in the world of fairies and djinn. Anyone who does a little probing of this type of lore realizes that cutesy victorian fairies are not very good representatives of the creatures of legend.
The main issue I had with this book was not the storytelling. I found that I wanted to know what happened next. There were points when I couldn't put it down. It was mainly the characters.
I realize now, that I have gone through most of this review without talking about plot. Here, there are several plots running. The first is the doomed romance of Jared and Tiffany Thatcher, which begins as a story of a too perfect couple with all the luck. Their text book courtship is interrupted when they are chosen as targets of baby snatching fae who replace their newborn son, Ewan, with Knocks, a hideous changeling. This drives Tiffany to suicide and Jared to a watery death at the hands of other dark forces. Knocks is the only survivor, and while he proves a good villain, he is probably the only well fleshed out character in the entire novel.
The second main plot is that of Colby Stevens, a little boy chosen by the cursed djinn Yashar to be "granted" a wish. When Colby's wish leads him into the dark realm of Austin Texas' fae Limestone Kingdom (yes, Austin Texas) he meets Ewan, grown into a boy around Colby's own age. While Ewan has grown into a precocious little boy seemingly beloved by the fae (especially Mallaigh or Molly, a young Sidhe) Knocks, Ewan's changeling counterpart seethes at Ewan's very existence.
Everything comes together when ghosts or demons from the past come together and Colby discovers that Ewan's fostering by the fae has been part of a sinister plan. Colby, being a young boy who knows no better uses his bond with Yashar to give himself the power to save Ewan. Of course this is also not for the best.
The story follows these characters, Colby, Ewan, Knocks into their adult hood and while it was a fun ride, once again, only Knocks' rage fully fleshes out his character. I would have liked to get to know Colby and Ewan a bit better. Neither or them seem to display the power of emotions I like to see in protagonists. Once again, this is what children's novels do so very well. A good author will know that a child must connect with several characters on many levels. Therefore they will flesh them out. I would have liked more "flesh" on these bones. Yashar, the cursed djinn may have been the only other character that had enough substance to intrigue me.
Also, I know there have been several complaints about the female characters being very thin. While I agree, I can forgive some of them due to their fae nature. Still, I really like to see a well written female character that does not only exist as a love interest. Tiffany Thatcher and Knock's adopted mother Leila were as close as we could get to a well written heroine, but neither of them seemed to stick around long enough to be more than plot devices. However, neither of these plot devices were particularly bad, so I am not sure how much of a complaint that is.
Littered between each chapter are "real" accounts of fairy activity from excerpts of a fake text written by a mysterious Phd. of metaphysical studies.
This is definitely worth a read. It is funny in places (especially when it comes to the dialogue between Yashar and the young Colby) and terrifying in others. However, there are parts of this novel that left me feeling like I had an itch I could never scratch. This was likely the holes in the characters.
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