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Dreaming Back
Leigh Haring endangers her life to discover why her sister died and becomes involved in an effort to prevent a government seizure of a valuable resource on native American reservation land
257 pages, Hardcover
First published October 1, 1993
15 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
May 31, 2017
Seeing as how my review is the first one, I'll try to cover everything I can about this book.
The story was interesting enough, but it was written very poorly. The prose was clunky and confusing. There was unnecessary information added, I presume, to make the book longer. There were points of view that were unannounced. There were missing segways in the settings. The whole book was just a mess. I feel as though this was the first script, and the editor just rubber stamped it without reading it, just to quickly cash in on the cozy mystery craze.
Above select chapters, we are told the setting. Others, we're not. There are two chapters in the book that take place in Ben's point of view, but that's not apparent until halfway down the page. His chapters are simply there for exposition and Info-dumping. Instead of incorporating Hopi myth and stories seamlessly into the novel (like other cozy mysteries weave in their niche) we get two very long, very boring chapters of Ben giving us all this unnecessary information about Hopi legend, and myth, and his backstory- which is absolutely not needed to tell the story at hand. It feels completely out of place.
The prose simply doesn't flow here at all. The settings change almost instantly, and you're left doubling back in the text to try to decipher when it was that Leigh (our main character) went from Arizona to sitting on an airplane- because you simply can't find that point on the page. Conversations are also confusing. There's three or more characters talking and there's no indication of who is saying what. There's backstory about Leigh and Leni's mother, Ruth, which is also unnecessary to the story at hand. There's too much fluff here and not enough meat- plain and simple. The meat that's there is so hidden in bad writing that it's hard to follow the story.
Leigh is fleshed out just enough, but even still, her actions at the end don't seem to come from anywhere. We don't know enough about other characters, like Vera or Richard- so when they are talked about like we know them, it just leads to more confusion. A name that's only mentioned a few times is said to be the reason behind the story's events.
The only reason I'm giving this one two stars is I finished it, and didn't hate it. I was disappointed in the way it was written, but I think it would have been a decent story if another author had written it.
The story was interesting enough, but it was written very poorly. The prose was clunky and confusing. There was unnecessary information added, I presume, to make the book longer. There were points of view that were unannounced. There were missing segways in the settings. The whole book was just a mess. I feel as though this was the first script, and the editor just rubber stamped it without reading it, just to quickly cash in on the cozy mystery craze.
Above select chapters, we are told the setting. Others, we're not. There are two chapters in the book that take place in Ben's point of view, but that's not apparent until halfway down the page. His chapters are simply there for exposition and Info-dumping. Instead of incorporating Hopi myth and stories seamlessly into the novel (like other cozy mysteries weave in their niche) we get two very long, very boring chapters of Ben giving us all this unnecessary information about Hopi legend, and myth, and his backstory- which is absolutely not needed to tell the story at hand. It feels completely out of place.
The prose simply doesn't flow here at all. The settings change almost instantly, and you're left doubling back in the text to try to decipher when it was that Leigh (our main character) went from Arizona to sitting on an airplane- because you simply can't find that point on the page. Conversations are also confusing. There's three or more characters talking and there's no indication of who is saying what. There's backstory about Leigh and Leni's mother, Ruth, which is also unnecessary to the story at hand. There's too much fluff here and not enough meat- plain and simple. The meat that's there is so hidden in bad writing that it's hard to follow the story.
Leigh is fleshed out just enough, but even still, her actions at the end don't seem to come from anywhere. We don't know enough about other characters, like Vera or Richard- so when they are talked about like we know them, it just leads to more confusion. A name that's only mentioned a few times is said to be the reason behind the story's events.
The only reason I'm giving this one two stars is I finished it, and didn't hate it. I was disappointed in the way it was written, but I think it would have been a decent story if another author had written it.
July 1, 2019
I did like this - I know the reviews are mixed - despite knowing the killer pretty much form the first chapter. The rest of the plot and finding that out was a draw, however - plus I often can figure out the killer quickly. What I liked less was the ending - it was good, but I wanted something more. And I would like to have seen more books by this author in this setting. But for a one-off, it was good, with a wonderful setting and strong characters.
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews