Freaks of a cold-blooded nature

Both the title and the cover have a fun dreamy quality, which is mainly why I picked it up. 

After years of traveling abroad with her dad and older brother, Jane’s errant family settle down in a property on Coney Island. Yes, that Coney Island: a stretch of land covered in rides, theme parks, and circus freaks. The offspring of said freaks (and other sundry) just happen to be Jane’s new classmates. There’s Babette, a dwarf who shops at Hot Topic; H.T., a legless guy who can breakdance like there’s no tomorrow; and Leo, whose beauty is beguiling and who has a seahorse tattoo that Jane finds hauntingly familiar. Unfortunately, Jane has also landed in the middle of a large dispute between the city and the denizens of Coney, and her family is at its center. Should she fight to keep all of those rides and parks that her late mother adored, preserving all of her memories and impress Leo to boot? Or should she support her father, a theme park designer who successfully presented his idea for a water slide, in the hopes of finally staying in one place for more than a year? Does she know what she wants?

I am always in awe of a book that can create a unique atmosphere, which involves a combination of word usage, setting description, and characters’ emotions. This is Dreamland’s strongest quality, successfully rendering a world that is part alien and part comfortingly familiar. We can understand why Jane falls under the spell of Coney Island and its mysteries, which is a large part of her journey. Also particularly well done is her relationship to her mother (a complex figure herself who we only see in Jane’s memories) as she attempts to literally unlock the secrets to her past. Time is a large theme here—time and ownership, and whether having enough of one leads to the triumph of the other. I was surprised with how effortlessly it all tied together, not to mention its sophisticated take on perspective and gray areas. Jane is allowed to be right without having to make mistake after mistake, which I found refreshing.

Where the novel isn’t quite up to scratch is its portrayal of its characters. The so-called freaks are actually just different-looking versions of teen novel clichés. Babette is the smart-aleck who pins herself to Jane’s side for no reason other than to move the plot along. Leo is the soulful hot guy who couldn't possibly be into Jane (or could he?). Venus, a girl covered in rose tattoos, is the alpha bitch who torments Jane because of her crush on Leo. I hate to say it, but there’s something Twilight-ish about how more than one male character falls for Jane, making two of the female characters jealous of her. And their Dreamland Social Club—which, by the way, is barely part of the plot until the end—is so obviously a clique even though they insist otherwise. Jane points this out, but otherwise this goes unnoticed. If Altebrando wanted to show us that these “freaks” are just like everyone else, she could have found more creative ways to do it.

But in the end, it’s Coney Island who has become the most important character, followed directly by Jane’s mother. The combination of mourning the past, wading through the eerie present, and looking towards a future of possibilities is a winner. Bittersweet with a lot of soul, Dreamland is a great ride. Rating: 3.5 mermaid tryouts out of 5.