Review: Dream a Little Dream by Kerstin Gier

Dream a Little Dream (Silber #1) by Kerstin Gier

Publisher: Henry Holt and Co. (BYR)

Goodreads link: (click here)

What's it about?

Olivia Silver and her younger sister Mia are about to start a new life...again. They've moved around a lot throughout their lives, but this time, it appears they might finally be setting down roots in London. Their mother has met a new man and things have gotten serious enough for their families to be joined and move in together. Her mother's new boyfriend, Ernest, isn't so bad, but moving in with him and his family is going to take some getting used to. His son, Grayson, is ok, in fact, he seems slightly indifferent to the situation, but his daughter, Florence, is quite objectionable and annoying. Liv and Mia have no choice but to accept the situation, but they still maintain their sarcastic wit about it all. 

So now, not only is Liv is adjusting to a new home and a new school, but she's also been having very strange and very vivid dreams lately. These dreams start with a mysterious door with a lizard-head knob, and when she walks through it, things get quite bizarre. Talking statues, a crazy girl with a hatchet, corridors filled with mysterious doors, a spooky graveyard and her new soon-to-be step-brother and his incredibly attractive friends from school are haunting her dreams. As she follows them through her dreams, she somehow ends up stuck in the middle of a very weird situation, and she soon realizes that there is more to the dreams than she could possibly imagine. The guys from her dreams seem to know things about her in the real, waking world, that she only revealed in the dreams. How can this be unless the dreams were real. As Liv investigates this possibility, she is drawn deeper into the dream world, where she discovers that she's unwittingly become a part of a dangerous ritual meant to summon a demon who promises great power and the fulfillment of wishes. It's too late for Liv to turn back now, but she's committed to seeing this through to the end. She knows how high the stakes are. She's also been getting closer to Henry, one of the cute guys involved in this whole mess, so she's got another reason to keep dreaming these strange dreams. Her dream of falling in love just might be coming true. Of course, her sudden involvement as the new girl with the hottest guys in school is not going unnoticed. The mysterious school gossip blogger has been featuring Liv a lot lately. But that's a whole other problem. Life sure has changed a lot for Liv in a short period of time. Hopefully she survives to see how it all turns out. 

My Thoughts

I really did enjoy this book. Dream a Little Dream is a delightful book about family, dreams and demon summoning with a cast of fun characters and lots of cute boys. It actually reminded me of some manga and anime series I've read/watched where a cute and quirky girl meets a group of incredibly gorgeous guys and then strange things happen:

The guys in Dream a Little Dream are just BEGGING to be drawn.

The book is slow building, but a delight to read. It was originally written in German and translated into English, I'm presuming by someone British because of some of the language. It worked for me. The story itself is rather dreamlike, too.

There were a lot of things I really liked about the book. I loved Liv as a character, she was funny, spunky and had lots of witty dialogue. I also really liked Henry as a love interest. He wasn't the most attractive of the group (that would be Arthur), but he's still gorgeous, sweet and amusing. Bonus points to this book because THERE'S NO A LOVE TRIANGLE!

Don't get me wrong, I do enjoy a good love triangle now and then, but sometimes it's nice to just watch a single relationship form and grow.

This book combines a coming of age teen romance, a family drama, Gossip Girl, a dreamy fantasy and a spooky mystery with a little bit of light horror. It's not action packed, but it holds your interest. All in all, I enjoyed it and I'm looking forward to the next book.

(My Goodreads rating 4/5 stars)

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<3 Michelle