Memory and Dream

by Charles de Lint

Book Overview

Charles De Lint has been hailed by the Toronto Star as one of the world's leading fantasists. His new novel focuses on a young artist whose mentor teaches her to paint creatures that come to life--but who also destroys her work and leaves her life in tatters. Years later, when she wishes to return to painting, she must face the terrible threat of her mentor's return.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0312855729
• ISBN13: 9780312855727
• Release Date: January 1994
• Publisher: Tor Books
• Length: 400 Pages
• Weight: 1.62 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.3" x 6.6" x 9.5"

Customer Reviews

A Great Story of Love, Art, and Dreams

This was my first by Charles de Lint, but it came highly recommended and didn't disappoint. The author weaves a beautiful world with magical creatures born in a moment when another unknowingly gives a part of their soul in the making of art. I love the artist community Charles created. I felt I was there walking the streets and visiting their local haunts with them. He pulls you in and doesn't leave you unfulfilled.

Shows us the world is a magical place

After I read _Memory and Dream_, I stumbled around for about a week just thinking, "Wow..." De Lint's work often affects me that way, but this book did it to me even more than usual. I think it's because the characters who populate De Lint's stories are so much like people I know. Most people don't tend to write about people I know, or people who think the way I do.The story is a deceptively simple one of an artist who is going through a change in her life being forced to own her past and her power. But although the theme is one that is seen often, De Lint makes it real in a way that no one else can. He has a very good heart knowledge of the true pain of life and he presents it in a way that neither minimizes it nor romanticizes it. He does the same with his urban settings; this is not a clean or perfect world, and stories are just as likely to happen in an alley as in a mansion.Because the settings and the characters are so real, it is easy to believe in the fantasy elements. De Lint's work often deals with the lives and experiences of artists, musicians, and storytellers. Their work is a kind of magic anyway; all De Lint does is make the magic more vivid. He really shows us how the world is a magical place, and when everyone else is saying real magic is dead that's a message I want to hear over and over again.

Beautiful book

This rates on my all-time favorites list, near the top. The book basically explains the past and present of a painter, Isabelle (Izzy) Copley, and how it is affecting her now. The basic idea of the book is the relationship between the artist and their creation: does the artist have to protect their creation, or should they bless it, release it, let it go? And on the side, it explores the ability we all have to rewrite reality -- when has it gone too far, and are we living in a world of our own creation instead of facing life? The book is very symbolic, can be read on many levels, and is a must-have for anyone who likes literary urban fantasy.

A special look at art and life and magic

My first DeLint, I am hooked on the eloquent prose, this dialogue and development of the characters..I felt I knew them and didn't want to book to end. The picture he paints with words about art and the arts in general are so true to life/ A good read for the summer

Grab a cup of tea and a cozy chair!

Charles De Lint's MEMORY AND DREAM is stunning in its story and style. This is the kind of book you keep in your mind forever and when it's over you feel as if your best friend's moved away! If you like your novels spiced with fantasy, heart and intellect, this one's for you. There's everything here: college and artists, the 70s and the 90s. Charles De Lint's tale is beauty at its deepest!

For all who search for magic and recreate enchanted reality.

As a book is read and moved from shelf to bedside and back again, it always gathers signs of how much it is loved. My own copy of Memory and Dream, a creamy hardcover, has now obtained a large watermark, countless bent and rippled pages, and worn edges that speak ofhow much love it. Memory and Dream is a book for anyone who wishes for a little magic in a world which can be such a cruel and bitter place. The story follows an artist, Isabelle Copley, who is brought back suddenly into her own past, jolted by a letter from a long- dead friend. As Isabelle went through her life, she unconciously developed the self-protective habit of rewriting her memory, creating a story of her past that is what she wants it to be rather than what it was. As she is slowly forced to confront the truths of the past and her own part in the events which drove her to her solitude, her past comes back to haunt her in many ways. The tale is also told by a variety of characters, from Isabelle to her friends and loves both past and present. The narrative travels back and forth between present and past, each timeline following its own progression until they collide in a revealing and extraordinary finish. The book is full of the excitement and danger of magic, the joy of creating, and characters who become people you know and care about. The emotional trip through the story is not a kind one, the desriptions of the beginning slowly building into a spiral of emotion and action that is haunting by the end. As with all of Charles de Lint1s novels, it ends as so often stories end in real life, bitter-sweet, something to be remembered and pondered over.