Review - Dreamstalkers

I was lucky enough to be sent a copy of this from the publishers in exchange for an honest review. All views and opinions are my own.

Dreamstalkers: The Night Train by Sarah Driver, cover art by Diana Renzina, published by Farshore 

Sarah Driver's The Huntress trilogy were some of the first books I read when I first started getting into Middle Grade reads not long after becoming a bookseller and they remain a favourite. Dreamstalkers' Bea Grimspuddle definitely shares some of Mouse's fierceness, determination and spark so as soon as I met her I knew I'd enjoy this newest book from Sarah Driver too!

 

Bea is something of an outsider in her rural community, prefering the company of rocks and animals and the wild to sneering peers and disapproving elders. She and her mother live on the outskirts of the settlement and when the rest of the village is forced to leave they are the only ones left to face the incoming nightmares...or so Bea thinks. With her mother ill and shadows at the door, the arrival of a stranger on a very unusual train and the sudden appearance of a former friend, Bea is thrown into a dangerous quest to stop the nightmares and mend her mother. 

 

And so she finds herself hurtling through the countryside on a sentient train with Martha, another local child and source of irritation, jealousy and maybe...just maybe...friendship. 

The journey on the train is one of my favourite parts of the book, with its library, midnight feasts and a shabby, wild sort of dereliction that feels somehow hopeful and eerie at one and the same time; it's a joyfully imaginative journey that retains an element of menace, thanks to the uncertain destination and the bear on the roof, and we swing between cosy moments, dreamstalking lore and danger. Another ticket please!

Armed only with some parting knowledge from home, what they've gleaned from the train and a mysterious object in a bag (I LOVED when we found out what this is - it is perfectly dark and magical!) Bea and Martha arrive in Silvervein, a city of mages and guilds and moveable buildings and a powerful queen with eyes everywhere. They have nowhere to turn and no idea who to trust - they barely trust each other - as they seek the source of the spreading nightmares and a way to stop them.

Dreamstalkers taps into our timeless fascination with dreams, nightmares and the night time, as well as with nature, folklore and the wild. With immersive dreamscapes unfolding like theatre, there is an almost surreal, cinematic quality to this which I adored and the unsteady, shifting realities of the dreams lent themself so well to the sense of foreboding and urgency within the book too.

I absolutely loved this; it has the sort of wild imagination fans of Abi Elphinstone, Pari Thompson or Tamzin Merchant would love but with a much creepier vibe. One thing I always love about Sarah Driver's books is the dark edge they often have. They are seldom without hope or moments of lightness to counter it, but she always seems ready to take us slightly further into the dark than many other children's authors and it's an unsettling place to be - in the best of ways!

 

There was so much I loved about this - the blot dragons, the train, the shadows, the queen, the mage, the dreams, Bea, Martha and Pip... and of course, "smell my owl" which I maintain is maybe the finest chapter title ever. I can't wait to see where this series (and the wonderful Night Train!) go next.