Strange the Dreamer Review
Title: Strange the Dreamer
Author: Laini Taylor
Publsiher: Little, Brown Books for Young Readers
Pages: 536
Rating: ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
Synopsis:
The dream chooses the dreamer, not the other way around—and Lazlo Strange, war orphan and junior librarian, has always feared that his dream chose poorly. Since he was five years old he’s been obsessed with the mythic lost city of Weep, but it would take someone bolder than he to cross half the world in search of it. Then a stunning opportunity presents itself, in the person of a hero called the Godslayer and a band of legendary warriors, and he has to seize his chance or lose his dream forever.
What happened in Weep two hundred years ago to cut it off from the rest of the world? What exactly did the Godslayer slay that went by the name of god? And what is the mysterious problem he now seeks help in solving?
The answers await in Weep, but so do more mysteries—including the blue-skinned goddess who appears in Lazlo’s dreams. How did he dream her before he knew she existed? And if all the gods are dead, why does she seem so real?
Welcome to Weep.
My Thoughts:
*May contain some spoilers!*
I really enjoyed this book! I was so excited to finally read it because I had been hearing so many awesome reviews for it in 2017, so I started it as soon as I could! It took me a while to get through it because it is a pretty hefty book, and I went through a little of a reading slump in December because I was so zombie-fied by school. I am so glad that I stuck with it though, because I ended up loving this novel and it made me feel all of the feels! This was also one of my Readuary books, so if you want to check out part of my reading journey for this book you can see my Readuary Update post!
There were so many positives about this book. I especially loved the characters though. Laini Taylor does such an amazing job of building deep characters that you feel like you really know their back story and understand them as a person. I loved Lazlo and Sarai!! Lazlo was such a sweet little bean, and I loved his genuine want to help and his innocence. I loved how Sarai had such forgiveness in her heart, and that she was not so jaded and fueled by hatred like some of the other godspawn. I loved having characters that were truly good people and wanted the best for everyone with no ulterior motives, and a couple that WAS INNOCENT. I loved that we got to watch a love story unfold that never turned into sex. I loved getting to see the butterflies in their stomach, the blushing when Lazlo told Sarai she was beautiful, and the euphoria of their first kiss. Yes, they did end up having some hot and heavy kissing, but it was after they had gone through the other stages of meeting, liking each other, doing on "dates" (if you want to call the dreams that), falling in love, and having their first kiss. I just really enjoyed getting to watch the whole process play out instead of having a couple that meets and two days later they are in love and having sex. A couple that was actually in love with each other for their personalities and their love of being together. They just had fun together and fell in love as they were spending time together. I could go on all day about how refreshing that was to see.
I also loved that Laini Taylor showed the strong internal battle of feelings inside of the Godslayer. He was a hero to his people and this big, strong man, but he was so broken. I loved getting to see the other side of being the hero. You are the one with the glory, but you also have to live with the things you had to do in order to become the hero. I thought it was really important to see the struggles that it brought to his personal life and to his own emotions. Being a strong hero does not mean that you do not have emotions, and it does not mean that what you did didn't come at a price to your own well-being.
Finally, I loved the world. I thought that the story of Weep was so magical, and I loved getting to see it from Lazlo's perspective. I thought that the world was so imaginative, and I loved learning the different powers the gods can have. I also liked that we got to see the reality of how we dream something to be is usually not how the real thing is at all. Usually, we build things up in our minds so high that the real thing is no where near what we have imagined. But that doesn't mean that the real thing doesn't still have amazing things to offer us, just like Weep still held so many amazing things for Lazlo to discover even though it was nothing like he had imagined it to be.
I didn't have very many negatives to this story, as I'm sure you can tell by now. My only critique would be that at times the story could drag a little bit. Towards the second half of the middle (if that makes any sense) I did begin feeling a little bit that something needed to happen because I was beginning to get bored. However, that was not enough of a flaw to bring down the rating of this book for me because a lot of the slow parts were building up a platform of back story for the big turn of events at the end of the story!
The end of the story killed me. Like I was deceased and had to take a day to recover. I wasn't super happy with the ending, not because it wasn't a great ending, but because it was not the ending that I wanted. You know what I mean? I totally understand why it had to end the way it did because we have to have a premise for the second book, but I am definitely one of those readers that always wants the fluffy, happy endings. That wasn't a flaw of the book though, that's just me being a girl and wanting all my books to be happy, love books 😂
Have you read Strange the Dreamer? If you did, let me know what you thought about it down below! I would love to know what you loved about it and/or what you didn't love about it! Thank you for reading!
*May contain some spoilers!*
I really enjoyed this book! I was so excited to finally read it because I had been hearing so many awesome reviews for it in 2017, so I started it as soon as I could! It took me a while to get through it because it is a pretty hefty book, and I went through a little of a reading slump in December because I was so zombie-fied by school. I am so glad that I stuck with it though, because I ended up loving this novel and it made me feel all of the feels! This was also one of my Readuary books, so if you want to check out part of my reading journey for this book you can see my Readuary Update post!
There were so many positives about this book. I especially loved the characters though. Laini Taylor does such an amazing job of building deep characters that you feel like you really know their back story and understand them as a person. I loved Lazlo and Sarai!! Lazlo was such a sweet little bean, and I loved his genuine want to help and his innocence. I loved how Sarai had such forgiveness in her heart, and that she was not so jaded and fueled by hatred like some of the other godspawn. I loved having characters that were truly good people and wanted the best for everyone with no ulterior motives, and a couple that WAS INNOCENT. I loved that we got to watch a love story unfold that never turned into sex. I loved getting to see the butterflies in their stomach, the blushing when Lazlo told Sarai she was beautiful, and the euphoria of their first kiss. Yes, they did end up having some hot and heavy kissing, but it was after they had gone through the other stages of meeting, liking each other, doing on "dates" (if you want to call the dreams that), falling in love, and having their first kiss. I just really enjoyed getting to watch the whole process play out instead of having a couple that meets and two days later they are in love and having sex. A couple that was actually in love with each other for their personalities and their love of being together. They just had fun together and fell in love as they were spending time together. I could go on all day about how refreshing that was to see.
I also loved that Laini Taylor showed the strong internal battle of feelings inside of the Godslayer. He was a hero to his people and this big, strong man, but he was so broken. I loved getting to see the other side of being the hero. You are the one with the glory, but you also have to live with the things you had to do in order to become the hero. I thought it was really important to see the struggles that it brought to his personal life and to his own emotions. Being a strong hero does not mean that you do not have emotions, and it does not mean that what you did didn't come at a price to your own well-being.
Finally, I loved the world. I thought that the story of Weep was so magical, and I loved getting to see it from Lazlo's perspective. I thought that the world was so imaginative, and I loved learning the different powers the gods can have. I also liked that we got to see the reality of how we dream something to be is usually not how the real thing is at all. Usually, we build things up in our minds so high that the real thing is no where near what we have imagined. But that doesn't mean that the real thing doesn't still have amazing things to offer us, just like Weep still held so many amazing things for Lazlo to discover even though it was nothing like he had imagined it to be.
I didn't have very many negatives to this story, as I'm sure you can tell by now. My only critique would be that at times the story could drag a little bit. Towards the second half of the middle (if that makes any sense) I did begin feeling a little bit that something needed to happen because I was beginning to get bored. However, that was not enough of a flaw to bring down the rating of this book for me because a lot of the slow parts were building up a platform of back story for the big turn of events at the end of the story!
The end of the story killed me. Like I was deceased and had to take a day to recover. I wasn't super happy with the ending, not because it wasn't a great ending, but because it was not the ending that I wanted. You know what I mean? I totally understand why it had to end the way it did because we have to have a premise for the second book, but I am definitely one of those readers that always wants the fluffy, happy endings. That wasn't a flaw of the book though, that's just me being a girl and wanting all my books to be happy, love books 😂
Have you read Strange the Dreamer? If you did, let me know what you thought about it down below! I would love to know what you loved about it and/or what you didn't love about it! Thank you for reading!
Comments
Post a Comment