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Nataliya's Reviews > What Dreams May Come
What Dreams May Come
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As hard as I tried to make myself care about this book and its characters, I just could not.
First of all, it is very tedious, with too much exposition and endless infodumps in the dialogue form. The story gets so bogged down in the exposition that it becomes very dull to follow. At times it reads like a technical manual, with dry and repetitive narration. In this book, Matheson for the most part tells instead of showing, which makes it hard for me to enjoy the story. The characters are poorly fleshed out, and the relationships between them are one-dimensional.
The afterlife world that could have had such potential to be exciting and fantastical is filled instead with arbitrary rules and regulations, and seems like a rather dry, boring, and bureaucratic place. What really frustrated me is that based on these rules, if a person, let's say, struggles with self-esteem or a mental illness, he or she would be eternally screwed here. Not cool.
Overall, reading this book felt like being beaten over the head with a lesson in morality, which was not that well-written either. Giving it 2 stars is almost a stretch, but I have read many books that were much worse.
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Also posted on .
First of all, it is very tedious, with too much exposition and endless infodumps in the dialogue form. The story gets so bogged down in the exposition that it becomes very dull to follow. At times it reads like a technical manual, with dry and repetitive narration. In this book, Matheson for the most part tells instead of showing, which makes it hard for me to enjoy the story. The characters are poorly fleshed out, and the relationships between them are one-dimensional.
The afterlife world that could have had such potential to be exciting and fantastical is filled instead with arbitrary rules and regulations, and seems like a rather dry, boring, and bureaucratic place. What really frustrated me is that based on these rules, if a person, let's say, struggles with self-esteem or a mental illness, he or she would be eternally screwed here. Not cool.
Overall, reading this book felt like being beaten over the head with a lesson in morality, which was not that well-written either. Giving it 2 stars is almost a stretch, but I have read many books that were much worse.
—â¶Ä”â¶Ä”â¶Ä”â¶Ä”â¶Ä�
Also posted on .
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What Dreams May Come.
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Reading Progress
February 20, 2012
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Started Reading
February 20, 2012
– Shelved
February 23, 2012
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Finished Reading
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Kim
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Mar 12, 2012 05:55PM
Have you seen the movie?
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I did - it was... ummm.... bright and colorful to the point of inducing seizures. But I did like it better than the book (and that rarely happens). For all his faults, Robin Williams made Chris more relatable and more human than book-Chris ever managed to be. I also like that the movie added children's story - in the book, it seemed strange that he barely give his kids a second thought after his death even though one of them was still pretty young.
I didn't mind the movie, though it was rather sappy. I never thought to look for the book it came from though, and now you've convinced me to not bother
![[Name Redacted]](https://images.gr-assets.com/users/1347082397p1/287915.jpg)
The crazy thing is that this book was written by the same guy who wrote the original vampire-world novella "I Am Legend" -- in which the hero commits suicide at the end. And the novel "A Stir of Echoes". And the classic William Shatner "Twilight Zone" episode "Nightmare at 20,000 Feet"!
I loved "I Am Legend". That one was excellent. Makes me even more disappointed in this one.
I saw the movie of this book years ago. I found out it was novel, and it definitely did not make me want to read the book. I thought the movie and storyline was just......dreadful.
I have to admit I was put-off by the weird hybridization of Judeo-Christianity and Reincarnation. It just didn't work for me.
Kathryn wrote: "I saw the movie of this book years ago. I found out it was novel, and it definitely did not make me want to read the book. I thought the movie and storyline was just......dreadful."I actually liked the movie - the colors and the atmosphere were quite surreal, and that appealed to me. The storyline was not that great, but the visual experience was awesome. The book, however, was such a dreadful journey through dryness!
Ian wrote: "I have to admit I was put-off by the weird hybridization of Judeo-Christianity and Reincarnation. It just didn't work for me."
I'm not an expert at religion, and so that aspect did not bother me at all. I guess the Reincarnation and the ideas of Christianity are indeed mutually exclusive, but I never even stopped to consider that while watching the movie or reading the book.
Yeah, i can't shut that part of my brain off. It's like my girlfriend whenever a sci-fi show deals with the brain. Reincarnation is largely antithetical to all Western and Near Eastern religions -- from Zoroastrianism to Islam. They all share a general belief in a teleological, eschatological physical resurrection -- which precludes the possibility of reincarnation. Even the cyclical "pagan" religions of Northern and Central Europe! I wrote a paper on it! ;)
Having loved someone who committed suicide, that theme in the film was hard to watch.
Susan wrote: "Having loved someone who committed suicide, that theme in the film was hard to watch."I'm sorry, Susan.
Thank you for your review. You worded it better than I ever could have. It was like a technical manuscript explaining a religion that I do not believe in. I felt it went no where and was tedious as well. This surprised me because Matheson is one of my favorite writers.
I read the first 30 pages with not much interest and quickly found out it was going to be what you described. So very boring, so much dialogue. Ok, so the air smells fresh. Oh no, someone comes to talk to Chris again. Boring. So strange, since I just read his Somewhere In Time before and that was capturing! But even in that book Matheson does not describe the places well. Hotel, beach,... right, but in the movie it is an enormous hotel. Many authors lack the ability to describe places accurately. Readers want a world created for them. If I wanted to use a lot of imagination, I could just close my eyes and not buy books.
I have a friend who loves this book and wants to discuss it with me, But it's so horrible, just like you said. All I can do is try.
Jessaka wrote: "I have a friend who loves this book and wants to discuss it with me, But it's so horrible, just like you said. All I can do is try."Watch the movie and pretend you’re excited about the book 😅
LOL. So far I'm just reading reviews. That is enough LOL again
I gave in I read the book I hated the book Review the book
I’m reading it right now and bored to death. (Maybe I’ll go to Summerland 😂)
I just wrote my two star review and your review is helping me to DNF this one. Honestly, the idea of any religion (including the one I grew up in) in which someone who suffers so much on earth so as to take their life gets to suffer in hell... it's sick. But the technical manual part of what you said, that. It's so boring! The only reason I've been continuing is I got the audio book so I've got some sunk cost fallacy going on.
Good point about the arbitrariness and tediousness of the "laws". Matheson's short stories show he was capable of great things, but this wasn't one of them.
