Tom Delonge is a man that continues to boggle my mind the more I research about him. Not only is he an author, but he’s a songwriter, a film producer, and a guitarist in his own band ‘Angels & Airwaves’. Combine all of that, and you get the creation of a multimedia project featuring the titular character, Poet Anderson.

And here’s a link to the trailer of the short film if you’re interested in that too:

 

For those who don’t know, Poet Anderson is a character that Delonge created in 2008 and is basically a heroic teenager who has the ability to manipulate dreams and nightmares in a mindscape of sleep. Since then, Poet has appeared in graphic novels, songs written by Delonge, and even an animated short film called ‘Poet Anderson: The Dream Walker’ (which is amazing on its own and I highly recommend looking for online). And now, with the help of New York Times bestselling author Suzanne Young, Tom Delonge gives us a written book that will tell the origin story of Poet Anderson in ‘Poet Anderson of Nightmares’. Does it hold up?

It does, but it may be clunky enough to turn off a lot of readers.

The book begins with two orphaned brothers named Jonas and Alan Anderson, who travel for work and are secretly Lucid Dreamers, humans who have the ability to become aware of their dreams and control them in the Dream World, a reality shared by humanity’s collective unconsciousness. Unfortunately after a car accident places Alan into a coma, Jonas is left alone in Seattle with no money, no other family, and no place to call home. All he can do is go to school, visit the hospital, and roam the dreamscape in hopes of finding his brother and waking him up.

A few weeks later, everything turns upside down for Jonas when he discovers he is a destined Poet, a Lucid Dreamer who guides lost dreamers from their nightmares to safety along with having unimaginable powers over the dreamscape. News of this has now made him a target for a diabolical Lucid Dreamer named REM (whose design is just creepy!), who wants Jonas’s abilities to escape into the Waking World and plunge it into nightmarish chaos.

Still desperate to save his brother, Jonas takes up the pseudonym ‘Poet Anderson’ and must fight his way through REM’s forces with the help of a Dream Walker named Jarabec in the Dream World, and the support of his love interest Samantha in the Waking World.

After seeing the short film originally and getting hyped on the idea of a novel series involving the memorable Poet Anderson, I didn’t know what to expect. And after reading this, I have to say that even as a stand-alone novel, it can be a clunky read for some people. Sometimes it feels like Delonge and his co-author are not letting scenes play out and are more concerned of letting plot points into the story. For example, the second and third chapters confused me by hastily introducing characters we wouldn’t know about until two-fifths later into the book. It felt out of place and would’ve been better to go through another edit.

Other than that, the rest of the book flows not only smoothly, but surprisingly well, almost like a lazy river fluidly floating to the climax of a ravaging waterfall. ‘Poet Anderson of Nightmares’ not only gave me what I expected from the plot of a dream-related YA novel. In fact, this almost reminds me of an anime movie I watched last year called ‘Paprika’ (directed by the legendary animator Satoshi Kon) about a young woman with two different identities trying to stop the abuse of a dreaming device. Not only did it have the same type of character of having two identities, but it made up for its similar problems by having imaginative dreams, dark themes and backgrounds, and a sense of innovation to the thin line between fantasy/reality. IT was really damn good at what it did best.

‘Poet Anderson of Nightmares’ does the same thing.

The characters and their designs (both in and outside the novel) are just very imaginative, and show off their personality in a way that you can hear and know what their voices sound like in your ear. Jonas/Poet’s voices can differentiate from an awkward but kindhearted loner into an independently semi-confident badass with a bowler hat, black suit, and umbrella. Jarabec is also very likeable being the wise old man who doesn’t sound monotone in his writing because he wants to sound important, but knows what he says is important. He’s the one who’s seen what his role as a Dream Walker can do to a person in the Waking World. He knows the risks, and is warning Jonas that becoming a Poet can be dangerous and is meant to not be taken lightly.

Then we have the villain of this named REM. How do I start with this guy? I didn’t see or hear of him until I read the book, but this is a very mysterious villain. He always talks to Poet/Jonas like he has absolutely nothing to fear; the nightmarish villain almost reminds me of Bill Cipher from ‘Gravity Falls’, being a dream villain who is powerful enough to destroy his foe, but also has a dark sense of humor mixed with ruthlessness. He’s even intimidating enough to have his creepy face larger than Poet’s on the front cover!

The Dream World in the novel is incredible based on the words of our authors, even if you haven’t seen or read anything Poet Anderson-related. It’s bright and shiny in some places, and is obviously a metaphor for the Internet and doing whatever you can’t do in the Waking World. One of the things I loved reading this is how in the Dream World Jonas and Sam are more open to each other than they can be in the Waking World and it feels natural. They’re actually adorable sometimes.

Surprisingly, my only other complaint with ‘Poet Anderson of Nightmares’ besides the first few chapters is that I was hoping to explore more of the Dream World. I mean, this is a place where the impossible can become reality and is endless with creative possibilities, but I often feel like I’m in a futuristic setting. But you can make the argument that since the Dream World is a collective unconsciousness that it would make sense it’d be formed as a giant city for people to do random things, much like any other city.

Overall, Tom Delonge and Suzanne Young’s first co-authored book is fun. Another edit may have helped this flow better in the beginning, but ‘Poet Anderson of Nightmares’ is an exciting read for anyone interested in the idea of Inception meeting Blade Runner.

~*~*~*~*~

If you have any questions or already have an opinion on the novel, feel free to leave any comments. Thanks!