The Dream Traveller: Dark Rising

The Dream Traveller, Book 1

By: John Nassari

Narrated by: Peter Kenny

Book one of the Dream Traveler Series.

Girvyn is unaware he possesses a unique gift: he can enter people's dreams, identifying him as a Dream Traveler. Girvyn aspires to follow in his uncle’s scholarly footsteps. Yet, his future veers off course when a dream entangles his fate with a forest tribe ravaged by demons, led by the rogue Traveler, Crane. Crane has long schemed to merge his nightmarish realm with the Waking world, a plan exposed by a lone survivor's harrowing tale. Crane's vulnerability lies in his physical form; destroying it would disperse his demonic legions. While some advocate for a global military alliance against him, others see hope in young Girvyn, who controls a mysterious and deadly gateway. However, uncle Laglen fears Girvyn is not prepared for such a grave role.

Girvyn must master his emerging abilities to navigate a destiny that binds him to an epic struggle between dreams and reality. With the world teetering on collapse, can Queen Amelia of Rathnell and her sworn protector, Elaya Faith, persuade other nations to join forces to assault Crane’s northern fortress, or will the fate of the waking world rest on the shoulders of a young scholar?

©2024 John Nassari (P)2024 John Nassari

Critic reviews

2024 Book Award Finalist, Page Turner Awards

2024 Silver Medal, General Fiction, eLit Awards

An engaging listen with a great narrator!

The Dream Traveller is the story of Girvyn, who is a teenage boy living in a world of druids and magic. What he doesn't know quite yet is that he, like his uncle, is a Dream Traveller, a group of people who can visit people's dreams, and manipulate their own. But more than just being a Dream Traveller, Girvyn can open portals to the dream realm and pull things into reality. There is only one other Traveller who can do this, a (bad) man named Crane who is planning on merging his nightmare realm with the real world. 

It's up to Girvyn to help stop him!

This was a light and quick listen. It's labelled as dark fantasy, but I didn't find it especially dark, personally. There was a lot of action though, and it was easy to just put on and listen to for hours while doing other things, so as an audiobook, I thought it was good. 

I didn't really like Girvyn a lot, though he did grow on me a little bit. I thought he was annoying, but since he is a teenager, he was written well enough to be annoying. I did like Elaya and Hazel, so they kept me invested in the story. There was some political shenanigans intermixed with the coming of age story as well, so that was interesting.  

What kept me listening most of all is that this book was narrated by Peter Kenny. A fantastic narration as always. All the characters had interesting voices and accents. 

This one got a little too infodumpy for me at times, but all told I had a good time with it. I would recommend this book to anyone who likes a solid coming of age story, or stories with magic systems built of dream manipulation. I had 3.5/5 stars of a good time with The Dream Traveller: Dark Rising. I may continue the series down the line, if I get a chance!