100 Books Like The Dream Master

What intrigues me about this book is the way the author, Margaret Atwood, took the (Genesis 30) story of Jacob, who impregnated his wife's handmaiden to produce the children which his wife could not conceive.

She then puts herself in the place of that handmaiden and asks some serious questions. Was that handmaid even given a choice in the matter? What would have happened to her if she had refused? She then rolls the same idea forward 4,000 years to a pseudo religious society in which the sole purpose of handmaidens is to use their bodies to conceive and gestate the next generation for those whom they serve.

Cliff Jones Jr. has threaded together an impressive anthology with Mirrormaze: A Dreampunk Anthology. I think the structure of the book with prompts to guide you through the maze makes this anthology distinctive. The stories cover a variety of genres but are always tied to that central topic, dreams.

There are many outstanding stories that I found interesting in their structure and content, but I won’t give anything away to influence your choices, you have to determine your own gems. The stories are well written, enjoyable, they make you reflect and with almost 30 stories, there are many viewpoints of what constitutes a ‘dream’.

It took me several weeks to meander my way through the maze, I’d jump in every time I had free time. I love short story anthologies, you can read a couple, be carried away to an imagined time and place, fall back to reality, until… show more.

David Mitchell is a master of dreaming up non-linear, mind-bending, genre-blending stories that fuse fantasy and reality, so he has plenty of candidates for this list. I chose Number9Dream, a wonderful and genuinely bizarre coming-of-age novel that keeps the reader constantly asking if any of this is real. With gangster battles, kamikaze diaries, deadly floods and earthquakes, family tragedy, a stuttering “Goatwriter,” and (spoiler) a concluding chapter that is a blank page, this is, on the surface, the dazzling tale of a Japanese student searching for a father he’s never met. But from the opening chapter, where Eiji fantasizes about outrageous ways to confront his father’s lawyer in her place of work, but never does, the reader quickly senses that this strange journey will forever change those open-minded souls brave enough to embark on it.

The book tells the story of a man who believes that his dreams influence reality. I loved it because it was strange and intriguing, mind-bending and surreal. Nothing was permanent, and even reality itself was questionable.

Ursula Le Guin explores the issues of climate change and overpopulation, pollution and the destruction of the environment though the characters’ personal experiences. She tackles racism and shows how one's life experiences shape their personality. The question of whether the end justifies the means keeps recurring in the narrative.

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. 

Once again, Ann Faraday offers practical and easy-to-use dream interpretation advice with a total absence of 'woo-woo.' It consistently reminds dreamers of the importance of personalising their dream interpretation rather than seeking out generic meanings in book form or online. 

Above all, this book truly demystifies dream work and empowers dreamers to believe that they don't need to consult a dream therapist, psychiatrist, or analyst to understand their dreams. They can use simple tools and techniques to understand the meaning of their night vision, their inner therapist, for themselves. 

Thomas Ligotti is one of the few writers whose work genuinely, profoundly scares me. His vision is underscored by an all-too-convincing commitment to pessimistic philosophy (which is accessibly detailed in his 2010 book The Conspiracy Against the Human Race). Songs of a Dead Dreamer is haunted by the philosophical outlooks of E. M. Cioran, Arthur Schopenhauer, H. P. Lovecraft, and Edgar Allan Poe, but Ligotti’s fixation on marionettes, dolls, and the illusory nature of human agency is singular and distinctive. This is a masterpiece of existentially disturbing dark literature.   

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!

I am including this book for its fascinating presentation of dreamwork, a timeless state where past, present, and future meet, offering you glimpses into your future every single night in your night vision. Written by journalist and science fiction writer Eric Wargo, reading it will most certainly stretch your mind and inspire your dream work. 

In centuries past, dreams were regarded as oracles predicting future outcomes, but that approach fell out of favour with the Freud and Jung revolution firmly placing dream decoding as a psychological personal awareness and growth tool.

Wargo does not discourage dreamers from working with their dreams as self-help tools, but he does present a powerful case for all dreams being potentially precognitive, offering an insight into potential futures.

This has it all. Every time I see the cover I think of the house where I grew up and I can picture the scene in the lounge on Christmas morning where I’m sorting the presents into piles for when my grandparents arrive, while watching this on BBC2. One year I got given it as a book, and it was a different experience to read it, but just as lovely.