Todd has a dead-end job, a dead-end relationship, and no particular goal in life. So when he sees an ad for a lucid dreaming experiment, he figures it'll be an easy way to make some extra money and get away from his girlfriend for a while.
He doesn't expect to quickly become a talented lucid dreamer. He doesn't expect weird, inexplicable out-of-body experiences. He doesn't expect danger. And he definitely doesn't expect the line between dreaming and reality to disappear.
Entertainment: ★★★
It was a nice quick read.
Plot: ★★★
It started off really well, had an unfortunate slump towards the middle where not much really happened, and then picked up again for an interesting ending. I enjoyed learning about dreaming, too.
Characters: ★
Frankly, Todd was kind of a wimp. And not in a relatable way, more like a wait-I'm-supposed-to-care-about-this-character? way. He makes efforts to cheat on his girlfriend/fiancee, in both dreams and real life; in fact, he generally behaves like a pig for much of the story. He has absolutely no motivation, no respect for anyone, and on top of everything he smokes. He was whiny. In one telling quote, "Well, he didn't care. He didn't care about anything. Nothing seemed to be worth the effort. Nobody paid any attention to him. Nobody respected him. Nobody loved him."
I was fed up and hoping for an unpleasant ending for him by a quarter of the way through the book.
The rest of the cast was just pretty... bland, I guess. Nobody really stood out to me as interesting or unique.
Writing: ★★★
There were several grammar errors that I found a little distracting, and then there was once scene where a character started off as Michael but then was written in twice as "John." I assume it was a typo but either way I think there were a couple of editing issues that bugged me.
That said, the writing was okay but I'd have preferred a little more description, of both the dreams and real life.
End Result: three stars. A decent book, but not amazingly excellent.
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