Dream Waters

I received a copy of this book courtesy of the author. I haven’t read much modern fantasy, and when the book arrived, I was very excited to check it out.

“Dream Waters” by Erin A. Jensen is the first book in a modern fantasy trilogy. Set in current times in a psychiatric ward somewhere in the USA, the story is about a young man called Charlie who can do something nobody else can. Charlie has something called Dream Sight: he can see people’s Dream forms – the forms people take when they enter the Dream World – and he can remember what happens when he’s transported to the Dream World every night. His reactions to his visions have ensured that he’s spent most of his adult life in psychiatric care, however when a beautiful new patient Emma arrives, Charlie begins to find out more about himself, his abilities and even some of the other patients. Most of all, however, he begins to learn about the darkness that threatens them all.

This book is quite the page turner. Jensen has a real knack for creating tension in her story, and I found myself racing through this book to see what happens next. One of the really arresting things about this book is Jensen’s ability to handle morally ambiguous situations. Reserving judgment as an author, she lets her characters nut out tricky issues between them (to avoid spoilers I won’t go into detail). Jensen is a very expressive and visceral writer and tense interpersonal connections are balanced out by some very engaging mild erotica.

I think one of the things that I would have to have seen more of was discussion of mental health issues. I thought that Jensen had a lot more capacity to explore existing issues in the mental health system and the diversity of reasons people find themselves in psychiatric units. She touched on things like group therapy, the impact of trauma and the imbalance of power between doctors and patients and did that very well. However, I think, particularly given the use of the Dream World as a tool for examining mental health from a different perspective, there’s room to go even deeper in following books. I would especially like to see more on the operation of psychiatric wards and the interplay between staff and patients. I am also really hoping to find out more about Emma in following books. At the moment most of the female characters are wilting flowers to be tended to by men, and it would be really great to see Emma grow into her own and regain some power and independence.

This is a unique book with a very interesting premise that turned out to be a quick and thrilling read. I think this would make a great summer book for someone looking for a new spin on the fantasy genre. Book 2 in the series, “Dream World” has just been released.