Book Review: Wake by Lisa McMann

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book, book review, dreams, life, magic, narration, paranormal, powers, relationships, romance, sleep, stories, teenagers, writing, YA, young adult

Wake

by Lisa McMann

genre: paranormal, YA

Are you fascinated by dreams? I am, so when I heard about this novel I had to read it!

Summary

(Taken from Goodreads)
For seventeen-year-old Janie, getting sucked into other people’s dreams is getting old. Especially the falling dreams, the naked-but-nobody-notices dreams, and the sex-crazed dreams. Janie’s seen enough fantasy booty to last her a lifetime. She can’t tell anybody about what she does they’d never believe her, or worse, they’d think she’s a freak. So Janie lives on the fringe, cursed with an ability she doesn’t want and can’t control. Then she falls into a gruesome nightmare, one that chills her to the bone. For the first time, Janie is more than a witness to someone else’s twisted psyche. She is a participant

Review

After recently reading Dracula, I really enjoyed what this novel provided me. I generally don’t enjoy YA novels as much because they can feel shallow and follow the “high school” formula but this novel was different. I do have to note though, that the main reason why I enjoyed this novel was because of the concept: Janie witnesses other people’s dreams.

Narrating Action

Tags

action, books, film, Gilmore Girls, movies, narration, television, The Booth at the End, writing

People tell writers to show rather than tell in scenes, but one of the fascinating things about the Gilmore Girls television series, is how well they pull off the exact opposite.  Characters recap events not filmed during conversation.  Either the scenes would have been too drawn out to film or too difficult.  Here are some of my favorite examples:

A hungover Lorelei sits in the inn’s kitchen after Lane’s wedding the episode before.  Her best friend Suki recaps some of the more interesting moments that would have been too drawn out to film.  Suki tells Lorelei about using an old man’s cane for a limbo contest, awkward gyrating, posing, and strutting as Lorelei used the wedding photographer to film her audition for Top Model, and ends with the exuberant departing cheer Lorelei used the night before.