The Dream Thieves: A Review

The second installment in the all-new series from the masterful, #1 NEW YORK TIMES bestselling author Maggie Stiefvater!

Now that the ley lines around Cabeswater have been woken, nothing for Ronan, Gansey, Blue, and Adam will be the same. Ronan, for one, is falling more and more deeply into his dreams, and his dreams are intruding more and more into waking life. Meanwhile, some very sinister people are looking for some of the same pieces of the Cabeswater puzzle that Gansey is after....

 

What feels like many moons ago, the lovely Maggie Stiefvater posted that you could pre-order a copy from The Fountain Bookstore (and it would come signed). So I did. Then I heard NetGalley had a copy, so I had to go request one. I may or may not have squealed and jumped up and down when I got the email I was approved (totally did). I nearly dropped everything to read it, but then I figured feeding my children *might* be a little more important. Might be. ;)

Giving up sleep, though, I plunged in and swam through amazing writing and interesting plot twists that I have come to associate with Stiefvater. Needless to say I'm screwed, though - I ended this one already wanting the third (and the fourth) book. But I can't rush dear Maggie, so I'll just have to (im)patiently wait. In other words, it was a great follow up to The Raven Boys (review).

I was going to summarize The Raven Boys for you, and actually I did. Then I deleted it. In her usual awesomeness, Maggie offered to do a recap for the Recaptains website. It can be found here. If you have read TRB and want to have a refresher before you read The Dream Thieves, or even if you have read both of them and want a refresher anyway, I strongly urge you to take a few minutes of your time and read the recap. She points out all the things you need to know before continuing on the journey.

If you don't want to go there, to quickly point out a few things: Adam and Blue have a "thing" going, Gansey is still on his search for Glendower - the lost Welsh King, Adam made a sacrifice to be Cabeswater's eyes and ears, and we discovered that Ronan takes things out of his dreams (such as his raven, Chainsaw).

All of that out of the way, on to the book at hand. :)

I was super excited to be around them all again - Blue, Gansey, Adam, Ronan, Noah... it was like being reunited with long lost friends. But, things are changing with Adam since the sacrifice he made at the end of book one. His friends are watching him carefully, noting the anger, the attitude differences. No one really knows what the sacrifice means, exactly, so they are left wondering, waiting to see what will happen to their Adam. He and Blue are teetering on the edge of something, and only time will tell which way their relationship will go.

Gansey... oh, Gansey. The focus isn't as much on him in this book, but he's definitely still the leader, the glue that holds the group together. He tries to save them all and it pains him when he can't, or they choose not to let him.

This book is mainly about Ronan, though. Ronan and his secrets, his family's secrets. We find out in TRB that he can take things out of dreams - such as Chainsaw. We get to experience some of those dreams, or nightmares, really, throughout the book. In doing so we learn so much about Ronan and we definitely get to see the Ronan that Gansey so desperately wants to save. 

I will be anxiously awaiting the next installment in the Raven Cycle. :)