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(5 votes) —
Recommended by Chris Poirier, Sonja Nitschke, and 1 other member.
Dreamers
A serialized novel, updating weekly.
To sleep, perchance to dream . . . or wake again in a different world.
This is the dual life of Muse, Love, and other Immortals like them. Split between two lives in two worlds, they never sleep, never dream, and never die. In one life they walk among us, unknown, in the other, they are worshiped as gods.
But they are not immune to the troubles of life — love, loneliness, loss, and the eternal question of where they came from and what their purpose is.
Dreamers
Life is but a dream...
Tags: fantasy mythic online novels past tense romance third person
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Editorial Reviews
Some beautiful writing
Dreamers is exactly my kind of story—quiet, thoughtful, full of loneliness and longing; a romance, in a way, but more about the myriad ways damaged people fight off the intimacy they so desperately want, than it is about warm and fuzzy romantic love.
Dreamers follows Muse, a young immortal who lives her days in our world, teaching music to whoever will pay her enough to get by, and never quite feeling that she fits in. She may be the greatest musician the world has ever known, but she hates the idea of fame, preferring a life of anonymity and quiet desperation. In fact, she often lives in her worn out car. But when Muse goes to sleep, she wakes up in the other world, a world where she is an eccentric demigod who blesses musical instruments, sends inspiration in response to prayers left in her mailbox, and lives off the generosity of her worshippers.
When the story opens, Muse has just moved to a new town—perhaps fleeing attachments she was forming in the last one—and shows up for work at a music store, where she is to teach piano to children. To her surprise, she recognizes the man behind the counter, and he her, even though they have never met before. In our world, at least. For he is Love, another immortal. And one she has no time for. In the other world, he is showy and gregarious and popular and throws grand parties every night and is constantly surrounded by adoring fans. All things that Muse finds very unseemly.
She thinks she has him all figured out. And when he invites her over for lunch, she accepts only because she is hungry. She hardly expects it to become a habit.
But Love isn’t as simple as Muse thinks. To her surprise, in our world, he’s patient, and kind, and unassuming. And a friendship begins to grow. Before long, Muse begins to wonder exactly what it is she and Love want out of their relationship. But she steadfastly avoids him in the other world, and he never leaves his estate to come visit her cottage, either.
Unlike some of her stories, Ms. Suleski does not write Dreamers ahead. As a result, the writing can be a bit uneven from chapter to chapter. However it’s never bad, and when it’s good, it’s very good: clean, elegant, and often beautiful. The characterization is careful and subtle, and the relationships develop in interesting and delightful ways, over time.
If you like quiet, beautiful writing, and can handle the slow pace and the lack of a strong plot, you will find Dreamers to be a rare gem. It’s one of my favourite stories, and I don’t think you should miss it.
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Once Upon a Dream
Dreamers is a quiet story, softly lilting from place to place, person to person, character to character.
It follows the story of Muse who never sleeps, but is in either our world or in the immortal world. Sometimes her action or thoughts reminds my own troubles as a writer, how my own muse is distant, wandering.
But mostly, I think, the story is about bits and pieces of life. And I love that, I really do. Sometimes life is amazing and beautiful and crazy weird, and sometimes life is ok, sometimes it’s just downright sad.
And I think Dreamers has a little bit of everything.
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Certainly a character-driven piece.
When I first read this story it was before I set my chapter limits so for this, I kept reading until the end (at the time 9 or 10 chapters) mainly because I was hoping for something to happen. While I really do like Sarah’s writing, I think this is one of the weaker pieces she has that I’ve read.
Yes, it’s a character-driven piece, something that she makes very clear but I read it because the concept of the duality of dreams I found wholeheartedly interesting, and still do. However, through those chapters that I read, I was longing for something, anything, to happen. To be fair, I’m not too big of a fan of character-driven stories but there are such works that don’t constantly dwell on the characters. Not all pieces are consistent internal musings.
I found the conversations between Muse and Love rather boring and mundane and they traveled on for chapters and chapters, the same conversations that really progressed to nowhere. I felt nothing for either of the two characters and I was rather sick of Muse about halfway into my reading. I understand that she’s supposed to be perfection but its constant reiteration got redundant quickly and it had me thinking, "Ok, I get it, she’s perfect. And then what?" The beginning was very much stalled because of this.
I was much more interested in the worlds around the characters than I was about the characters themselves, especially the whole waking/dreaming concept that Sarah’s writing about. I got an inkling of world building but that’s it. The focus was solely on the characters internal thoughts about each other. I could have settled for how they reacted to the worlds around them. At least then I would have had a better grasp on the scenery. But from what I read, I didn’t get that. I wanted to know more about them, how they existed in these worlds, just what these worlds were like instead of what today’s piano lesson was about. I was very much longing for a point as well as some better insight into the surroundings because I was finished with the characters before I stopped reading.
That’s not to say the writing’s bad. I certainly know it’s not but it’s, to me, a very meandering story. It’s not an action-type of story and while I’m not asking for cannons, maybe a cracker or two wouldn’t hurt. I just got bored with it and kind of kicked myself when I got to the end because I knew that nothing was going to happen but I kept reading in the hopes that something would, and it didn’t.
This story is actually one of Sarah’s more popular pieces next to Alisiyad but it just didn’t do it for me. I just couldn’t keep reading about a character that would wander on about how much of a drain being perfect was and how hard it was to not get any sleep because she was jumping from world to world. Not to mention Love and his musings about his music shop. Quaint but dull.
If you like character-driven stories, I’m sure you’ll love this. Like I said, it’s pretty popular. But if you’re looking for action, you’re barking up the wrong serial tree. Fantasy its got, and some rather interesting concepts at that but it all depends on how you like it portrayed.
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