The Dreaming Place
core novel 1990 Newford
Record
| First published | 1990 |
|---|---|
| Original language |  EN |
| Work type | novel |
| Canon status | core |
| Reader rating | 3.92 (1,798 ratings, collected 2026-08-27) |
| Page count | 134 |
| First-edition ISBN | 9780689315718 |
Synopsis
The Dreaming Place, the opening novel of Charles de Lint's Newford sequence, is set in de Lint's fictional city and follows two cousins of very different temperaments. Nina, a conscientious straight-A student, begins suffering disturbing nightmares in which she finds herself trapped inside the bodies of animals, and when these episodes start bleeding into her waking life she suspects her cousin Ash, who practices magic, of somehow being responsible. The true cause proves to be an Otherworld spirit, a manitou capable of forcing a person's mind and soul into animal form, which has fixed on Nina as its target. Ash, who is also wrestling with her own deep-seated anger, must come to terms with her untrained abilities in order to have any chance of freeing her cousin from the creature's grip.
Where it sits
- Universe: Newford
- Series: Newford, core novels core; position 1 of 3 in the series' recorded order
- Author: Charles de Lint
Awards (verified)
- World Fantasy Award (Best Collection), 2000: won; Won by Moonlight and Vines, a Newford-set short story collection (not itself catalogued as a novel here).
Notes
- From the series record (Newford, core novels): Widely-cited central novels of the fictional city of Newford, an urban-fantasy setting for many further novels and story collections.
Neighbouring works
Publication order and internal chronology are tracked as two separate orderings and are never conflated: a book's place in one says nothing about its place in the other.
- Publication order, within the series Newford, core novels: position 1 of 3: next Memory and Dream (1994)
Sources
- Wikipedia: Charles de Lint
- https://www.charlesdelint.com/dreaming-desc01.htm
- World Fantasy Convention: 1980 winners/nominees (sfadb corroboration of 2000 WFA Best Collection)
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