Dream Spinner

March 1, 2007
Gr 9 Up-After a car accident in which Jori is permanently disfigured, the once-popular high school student is now an outcast. She is tormented by her former best friend, Marisa, and a geeky guy named Newt is the only person who talks to her. Her younger sister, Lisa, has been missing for months. The plot veers into fantasy/horror territory when Jori and Newt stumble upon a mysterious house inhabited by the eerie Mr. DePris. Among his amazing objects is a tapestry of stolen dreams, woven by a telepathic spider, Arachnea. Jori discovers that Lisa is captured in it, along with Newt, Marisa, and Marisa's boyfriend, Derek. When Jori enters the tapestry, determined to rescue her sister, the story finally gets moving. She finds Newt and Derek, and the three of them try to outrun the Black River that is killing some of the fantasies, along with the people who are locked in them. Their adventure leads them through several horrific and a few too-good-to-be-true dreamscapes. Jori's rescue mission is only partly successful, leaving an opening for a sequel. The tapestry world is vividly imagined, and the beautiful-fantasies-turned-ugly theme is gripping. However, the writing is uneven, and the story has gaps in logic. Also, Arachnea's change from foe to ally and Derek's transformation from a complete jerk into a hero figure are too sudden to be convincing. This book is a decent effort by a new author for teens who like fantasy-world-gone-wrong stories, but Neil Shusterman's "Full Tilt" (S & S, 2003) is a better choice."Martha Simpson, Stratford Library Association, CT"

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