100 Books Like Songs of a Dead Dreamer and Grimscribe

This book originally consisted of six short collections of novellas and stories, but they’ve since been gathered into a two-volume set, so I’m hoping I can count them as one. They go together, and I think they’re nearly all excellent.

When I was a kid, these stories helped build a bridge for me, from the likes of Stephen King (whom I still adore) to new imaginative worlds of horror that include all kinds of transgressive imagery.

I love how Barker combines the fantastic with the visceral, blurs lines between the monstrous and the human, and makes desire dark, dirty, and wonderful. I also love these stories for all they taught me and helping usher in modern extreme/hardcore horror.

Kathe Koja changed everything with the release of The Cipher in 1991, emerging as the most exhilarating new voice in American dark fiction since the arrival of Stephen King nearly two decades prior. Her work is characterized by hyper-sensory immersion into complex subjectivities, achieved by an inimitable, modernism-tinged voice. Koja is a master novelist, and it’s a rush to read her style within the more condensed form of short fiction; once you’re finished with Extremities, be sure to pick up her genre-expanding 2020 collection, Velo/Cities.

This book's heightened literary consciousness suggests a lifetime of practice, but it is, in fact, Gwendolyn Kiste's debut (she has quickly become one of contemporary dark fiction’s most celebrated, leading figures). Throughout Untether, the author examines both societal and individual forms of suffering (e.g. depression, dissociation, and the dangers of socially imposed normativities). My favorite piece is “Skin Like Honey and Lace,” which depicts a group of women who achieve social induction by taking skin from strangers and applying it to their own bodies. A staggeringly accomplished collection. 

Scarlett R. Algee’s debut collection is an exemplar of concision, comprised of stories that have been sanded down to their unsettling essences for maximally chilling impact. Bleedthrough deftly navigates the space where beauty and horror intermingle, often boldly upending genre conventions in the process. These pieces are vivid and absorbing, drawing fully realized worlds before exposing the terrible things that lurk on the peripheries.   

James Hillman is the kind of writer you sometimes have to stop, think and re-read, to work your way into what he is trying to say, but it repays the effort because what he says is always interesting. This book, about fantasy and imagination, explores the idea that we are more than our personal story, more than ego and self. For me as a writer, it changed the way I see the creative process, with imagination not being something we need to spark and drive, but a space we already inhabit. Imagination is our essence; we are the dream.

Season of Mists is my favorite of Gaiman’s graphic novels from his stellar Sandman run. Death, Dream’s older sister, appears at the end of the first arc and proved to be a fan favorite from that first on-page appearance. She’s a lovely, sweet, and utterly kind incarnation of the boundary that severs this life from whatever comes after. Gaiman creating a comforting presence out of an idea that terrifies most people. She’s charming in this installment, forcing her brother to face his misdeeds with compassion and honesty. It’s no wonder she is one of the only people in his family that Dream listens to!

The Dream Master was originally published in Amazing (Jan/Feb 1965) titled, He Who Shapes. The novella won Roger Zelazny a Nebula Award in 1966. I have re-read this novel several times over the years, and subconsciously I think it influenced the premise for Dream Phaze. Some of the tech is a little outdated by today’s terms, but the overall idea is still fresh.

This book introduces the reader to Marc Bregman - a postman turned dream interpreter whose approach breaks through intellectual interpretations of dreams to the emotional experience of your predicament in life. Dreams show you the path out of your predicament – usually through connecting with what used to be called “your inner child” but here is redefined as being childlike in your sense of adventure and mystery in life. 

The method shown in this book goes far beyond dream interpretation to using a dream to heal your life, your relationships, your career confusions, and more. The images in the dream are medicine and can be recalled to offer healing in your waking life. Full disclosure – Marc Bregman was my dream therapist for several years, I found him through this book.

This book, written by an actual dream researcher, presents a smart and easy-to-read introduction to the psychology of dreams. Covering topics like the history of dreaming, how dreams are scientifically studied, how to work with dreams for personal insight, the possible functions of dreams, lucid dreaming, nightmares, and what the future of dream research may hold, Malinowski does a commendable job of introducing the reader to a wealth of information about dreams. Complete with personal examples, eye-opening insights, and a thoughtful discussion of ethical questions surrounding emerging dream-related technologies, this delightful book is sure to please those looking for an engaging introduction to dreams.

I know what you’re thinking, “Freud, really?” Yes, really.

This is one of the origins of that wildly counterintuitive idea that the best way to enlarge the scope of your world is to pay attention to your dreams. But apart from specialized scholars and practicing clinicians, who can read all 700 pages of his giant tomb, The Interpretation of Dreams?

Even Freud realized he needed a shorter book for his ideas to reach the public. So, he produced this “brochure” (as he called it) aimed at a general audience. All of his big ideas are here—dream-work, day residues, the unconscious—but in a much more manageable size.

And reading it offers proof that psychoanalysis remains as vital today as it did when it was invented 125 years ago.