Dream Maps

(Originally reviewed on Goodreads in June 2018.)

Exiled prince Damen has every reason to hate underdog prince Laurent—except maybe he doesn't know Laurent at all. What better way for them to get to know one another than to embark on a sexually tense buddy-cop adventure across Vere, full of surreptitious glances and uncomfortable sleeping arrangements? I review the second volume of C.S. Pacat's romance melodrama trilogy, Captive Prince.

( After the trauma-fest that is Captive Prince, this novel is an absolute romp. - 400 words, moderate spoilers )

Last year I read Anthony Hope's 1894 adventure novel, The Prisoner of Zenda. I have not read much in the way of classic adventure fiction - I once started reading The Count of Monte Cristo, only to discover I was reading an abridged version and the original was 1300 pages long, so nope.

Happily, Zenda is much shorter, and as I am currently working on a writing project set in a fictionalized Central Europe (which may or may not see the light of day), I wanted to take a gander at the original Ruritanian romance.

( It was... interesting. - 600 words, minor spoilers )

Hello, friends! Welcome to Dream Maps, a blog about speculative fiction and other art-shaped things.

I'm Rebecca / Becky, and I have been obsessed with storytelling pretty much since I learned to read (at, I am told, an unnaturally young age). I primarily read science fiction, fantasy, and comics, and I also write science fiction and fantasy.

I've been reviewing books at Goodreads for 12 years(!!), but I've long been hankering for a separate place to publish longer reviews and essays. Also, I like the idea of archiving my content somewhere that isn't owned by Amazon.

Are book blogs still a thing? Whatever, it's 2019, the internet is over and I can do what I want.

About the title: I think of myself with someone with a middling visual imagination, but I have very immersive dreams about imaginary places. I love reading fiction about worlds that feel spacious and lived-in. I am fascinated by maps, but especially maps of cities, real or imaginary. I gave the title "Dream Maps" to a very short autobiographical zine I made a couple years back and thought I would repurpose it for this endeavor.