Cat and The Dreamer - Annalisa Crawford - ★★★★.¼

AUTHOR: Annalisa Crawford

GENRE: Literary Fiction

RATING: 4.25 stars.

In a Nutshell: Don’t be fooled by that dreamy cover. This gets quite dark at times. Excellent for *select* literary fiction lovers. It’s a slow mood read, but proceeds beautifully.

Story Synopsis:

When Julia was fifteen, she entered into a suicide pact with her schoolmate Rachel. Rachel died, Julia didn’t.

Now, fifteen years later, Julia is still struggling with her past and the guilt of being the one who survived. Moreover, she is constantly in the world of her imagination, which are dominated by a composite character called Cat who always puts Julia down.

When a new work colleague named Adam enters Julia’s life, she sees a chance to break free of past shackles. But will ‘Cat’ let her go that easily?

The story is written in the first person perspective of Julia.

I had picked up this author’s short story collection – The Clock in My Mother's House and Other Stories – earlier this year and was blown away by her creative thinking. So when I saw that one of her old novels had been edited and readied for a fresh release in April 2023, I grabbed the opportunity to read it. So glad I did so!

Here’s what you need to know about this novella:

🌺 The imaginativeness of the plot mixes perfectly with the groundedness of its themes. Bullying, suicidal ideation and dealing with a friend’s death are all intense topics, but the author handles them with fair aplomb. I appreciate how she neither condones nor condemns the actions of the characters, but allows them to speak for themselves.

🌺 When I reached page thirty, I realised that I was totally lost in the ‘who is who’ guessing game because of Julia’s habit of referring to all her bullies as ‘Cat’. Only when I reread the blurb did I understand that Cat was multiple characters rolled into one. I simply started again from the beginning and the second time around, things were smoother. So just go with the flow at the start, keeping in mind that every negative character in Julia’s life is ‘Cat.’

🌺 Unlike what you would expect, the titular ‘Cat’ isn’t the main protagonist but the main antagonist. As a composite character, Cat encompasses all of Julia’s past and present persecutors: the school bullies, a particularly nasty work colleague, and even Rachel, which is also why her behaviour seems so farfetched. Cat’s role in the story is complicated but essential. While I would have preferred to have more clarity about Cat at the beginning, I can also see why the author chose to write her as a unified singular.

🌺 ‘The Dreamer’ in the title is thus Julia. And she demonstrates the reason behind this nomenclature in every scene. Julia has a tendency of slipping into the world of her mind right in between a scene or a conversation. Your experience of the book will depend highly on how comfortable you feel travelling between the real and the surreal fluidly along with her.

🌺 The writing becomes a tad confusing also because Julia’s thoughts swerve almost casually between reality and imagination, leaving us scampering to keep track with her. This is exacerbated by Julia’s habit of ‘speaking’ to ‘Cat’ using the second person ‘you’. The formatting, indicating the dreams with italicised letters, helps tremendously. But you still need to stay focussed. This is not a book to be speed-read (or even heard on audio, if ever the option comes up in the future.) It needs (and deserves) your highest concentration.

🌺 Julia’s character grows on you. She begins as someone who seems to have no spine, until you realise why she acts the way she does. Her attempt to break free of the past can be termed as a ‘coming-of-age’, though she is thirty, because in her mind, she is still fifteen, and still haunted by the demons of her teen years. It is a pleasure to see her shattering her shell and discover her courage as the pages move ahead.

🌺 Though Julia’s parents have only minor appearances, I liked their portrayal as well. As a parent, I could understand how they might have felt about their child making a suicide pact, and why they never wanted to let her away from their eyes. They did not realise that what they were doing out of love and protectiveness was stifling their daughter’s present and killing her chance at a happier future. Truly appreciate how realistically they were sketched.

🌺 Adam is a bit too good to be true. I wish he too had been as realistic as the ladies in the story. Nevertheless, if you want a swoony loveable hero, Adam is your man. Hey, someone has to be the ray of sunshine in an otherwise gloomy story, right? 😉

🌺 The ending makes the journey worth it, but would it satisfy all readers? I am not sure. It doesn’t tie all loose ends. However, at times, a HFN is even better than a HEA as it strikes more realistic bells. This is one such case.

All in all, I know this is not a novella that will click with everyone. Only readers with a preference for character-oriented literary fiction, and who don’t mind surrealism and realism juxtaposed without boundaries can try this indie work. But such readers will relish the poignant experience and the hopeful ending. Now it is up to you to decide if you are such a reader or not. As far as I am concerned, I am glad I picked it up. This story won’t leave me easily.

My thanks to author Annalisa Crawford for providing me with a complimentary copy of “Cat & The Dreamer”. This review is voluntary and contains my honest opinion about the book.