The Laughing Listener
January 2019
*I was graciously given a free copy in exchange for an honest review*
Format: Ebook ARC
Overall Rating: 4 Stars

Wow, this book was… insane. When I read the summary for this a while ago, I thought I knew exactly what I was getting into—a fun fantasy romance about the Sandman battling evil. But man, this was DARK. Way darker than I was prepared for and I loved it!



It took me a hot minute to get into this story because the beginning was pretty much everything I was expecting. Originally I had thought this was going to be a light, fun story about the Sandman falling for one of his dreamers while he battled against the bad guys. And initially that’s exactly what I got, which wasn’t a bad thing... Just not that exciting. However, a few chapters in, a girl at the mall stabs herself with a pen and I quickly realized how wrong I was. After that, it was jarring how crazy the story got and it had me reeling, but I was so intrigued.

The farther into the book you go, the more you get to see of the dream world—the place where the Sandman lives and where Nora goes when she falls asleep. That’s when this book really grabbed me. A whole other world was slowly exposed to us bit by bit and it was so fun to read about! With dreams being the basis of this universe, literally anything is possible and it was cool seeing what Duell did with that.

It all leads to one crazy ass ending and I’m SO CURIOUS to see where book two goes!! Everything we see in the second half is really what made me fall for this story and I can’t wait to see what role the characters will play and what will happen. I’m bursting to say more, but I feel like I’ll give it away!!



I will say that I just wasn’t that into the romance aspect of this book? It’s hard to put my finger on why because I really liked both the main characters. But their relationship is already pretty well established at the start of the story, so when they finally confessed their feelings there was no real pay off or gratification. I kind of just wanted them to get on with it so I could find out what happened.

FINAL WORD

I am soooo here for the dark vibes of this book and now I can’t wait for the next installment!

#1 ↦ Dream Keeper ↦ ✦✦✦✦✧
#2 ↦ [b:Dark Consort|40949184|Dark Consort (The Dark Dreamer Trilogy, #2)|Amber R. Duell|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1533862964s/40949184.jpg|63860303] ↦ ?????
#3 ↦ [b:Night Warden|40949200|Night Warden (The Dark Dreamer Trilogy, #3)|Amber R. Duell|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1533863690s/40949200.jpg|63860373] ↦ ?????