What happens when seven young strangers find themselves in a Great White Room, with no memory of how they got there, and no clue how to get home?
The premise of Elise Celine’s young adult novel, John Dreamer, is an interesting one. The synopsis (as well as the lovely cover) drew me to this book, and I knew it had to be the next choice on my “must read” list:
Andy wasn’t usually sure about much, but she was absolutely certain this was the weirdest day of her life as she stood stranded in the middle of a great white room with six strangers. Well, they were mostly strangers. She could have sworn she’d seen the guy with the green eyes before, and maybe that was why he kept staring at her. When a man calling himself the Guardian appeared and said they had come to make their deepest dreams come true, they embark on an adventure none of them ever imagined, and the consequences of their actions would change them forever.
I honestly think that John Dreamer has a lot of potential. The storyline is intriguing and the characters all have a lot to say. However, it may have been published too hastily. As a writing student, I sat through many seminars where the importance of proofreading was stressed. This novel had a lot of grammatical and formatting errors (especially in the dialogue), and that really pulled me out of the story. Another read-through or two before publishing could have made all the difference in this case.
Andrea, or Andy, is the narrator of the story (aside from a single chapter narrated by Roy). I know how she looks (beautiful), and I know how quickly she falls in love with John (8 ½ seconds), but I didn’t know much else about her. I felt similarly about the other characters. The plot moved very quickly; because of this, I didn’t feel like I was able to really connect with any of them. I would have liked to see some more scenes where the characters interacted with each other, or panicked about their situations. Because of Andy’s face value observations, and the fast pace of the plot, the characters are more like caricatures. Olivia is a bossy rich girl. Matty is overweight and shy. By the end of the story I’d forgotten all about Marcus, who is in the Great White Room for the shortest amount of time. He made no impression whatsoever.
I can’t stress enough that I really did love the premise of John Dreamer. The story raises a lot of questions, and the setting is incredibly unique. There were some moments of absurd humor, especially involving the character of The Guardian. A man dressed all in silver, who demands applause after every entrance? This has the potential to be really fun and memorable. I do think, like Andy, readers could fall in love with John Dreamer. The author needs to realize that falling in love with a character takes longer than the instantaneous love the narrator feels. We need to come to the conclusion ourselves through the course of the story. It takes more than 8 ½ seconds. It takes a little more substance.
If Ms. Celine is going to continue the series (John Dreamer is described as “the first in the series of books set in the confines of the Great White Room”), I hope she will consider developing the characters further. Each character shares an important message, but they didn’t stick around long enough for me to feel the weight.
Rating: 3/10
Published: February 1, 2014
Source: NetGalley
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