The Curious Dreamer’s Dream Essentials

Dream interpretation is something which has always fascinated me. I'm the kind of person who has lucid dreams on a regular basis and often wonders just what some of the more confusing or fantastical elements might mean. Thus, when I came across this book, I knew I had to give it a chance. After all, it claims to be the “all-in-one dream interpretation book and concise dream dictionary” and that seems like a very useful tool to have.

Unfortunately, it's not really ALL in one, as the semi-frequent mentions of this author's other, larger books containing dream analysis guides make abundantly clear. This is more of a small refresher and a newbie's guide, I'd say. So keep that in mind while proceeding; you won't be getting the be-all, end-all guidebook here. But that's not really what this book wants to be, and thus I question the subtitle quite a bit. This book is fairly upfront from the start that it's meant to lead you into the process of interpreting and recognizing symbolism in your dreams - not to be some magic book which tells you definitively what everything means.

In that regard, I found the book to be quite refreshing. Unlike some other sources I've found over the years, it doesn't pretend that we don't know our own minds better than some stranger's dictionary of dream elements might. The author reminds her readers that, because dreams are manifestations of our worries and subconscious thoughts, the symbols we find may not mean what they commonly do for others and, ultimately, we should listen to our intuition. If the gut instinct is, “no, that's not what this means to me,” then we should listen. I wish I could go back in time and hand this advice to my teenage self, who was led down a scary path of thinking her dreams meant certain doom because of what online dream interpretations insisted the darker symbols meant.

Overall, I'm happy with the guide to dream analysis and the advice it gives. However, it could use a bit of polish here and there. For example, it sometimes reads as if the author is trying to pad paragraphs for length like a student desperate to finish an essay, and that can get repetitive quickly. (eg. “Intuition is key in understanding dream meaning because it is the part of you that recognizes the truth. It's through your intuition that you recognize the true meaning of a dream.”) I ended up skimming through a few paragraphs, if only because it felt like I was having a Groundhog Day moment - the same thing, over and over, just presented with slight variations.

The symbols dictionary section contains fifty things ranging from very common (cats, words, being naked) to slightly more obscure (wallet, being rescued, things/people being next to other things/people), along with some useful information on what each might mean. However, it feels rather lacking compared to what I expected from a book proclaiming to be an All-In-One. It feels more like a basic primer, and honestly contains details anyone could find online for free.

Don't get this book for the sake of the dream dictionary; you'd be wasting your money. But if you want a primer for dream analysis and some useful insight on how to make sense of what you dream, this may very well be useful for you. I'd dare say, though, that it might be a better deal to go for one or both of the author's larger books instead if you already know you're very seriously interested in dedicating time and energy to analyze your dreams; this book seems at times more like a preview for those, right down to including a sizable excerpt from one.

(Note: I received an Advance Review Copy of this book for free from Book Sirens, and have chosen to provide honest insights on what I've read within. I do consider the book to be worth the current Amazon list price of slightly under $3.)