Dreamrider- Review by Brett Coatney

Dreamrider

by Barry Jonsberg

*** stars

Dreamrider is a book about a boy named Michael Terny who has been to seven different schools in the last four years because he is bullied about his weight. Michael tries to go through his life unnoticed, but it is hard to miss a kid of his size. His classmates laugh and make fun of him, though he believes if anything is done by authority figures it will make things worse. It is hard going to a new school, but Michael meets a nice girl at school who he really likes named Leah. She helps him along throughout the book and always seems to be by his side, one of the few students who have shown Michael kindness at his new school.

The title Dreamrider comes in to play whenever Michael dreams he knows he is dreaming and can control what occurs in the dreams. Michael’s dream world is his only safe place; it’s a place where he can control everything that unfolds. While reading the book there were times I didn’t know if he was dreaming or it was reality, much like main character Michael. Dreams and reality become hard to discern because the two worlds are colliding. It could be an amazing power, or too much to handle.

The writer of the book used a short sentence, not much detail style. To me that is good because it makes the read short and easy. It also won’t put you to sleep with long boring details, but it might fail to grab your attention in the first place. Though the ending is not quite what I expected, I found it sort of disappointing. I did like the book, but I would not recommend it because the ending.