Sometime in the early 1900s, a stranger comes to an unnamed American rural town. His name is Robert Owens, and the winter day he arrives, a young boy goes missing. Robert, though a newcomer, volunteers to help search, which creates a favorable first impression. He also dresses well, has courtly manners that people aren’t used to, and an engaging, unpretentious acceptance of human foibles, a trait that, as events prove, they’re used to even less.

Naturally, they wonder why he’s come, and whether he has designs on the widow in whose boardinghouse he lives. He doesn’t. He’s a traveling salesman, of sorts, and his product is dreams.

Once word gets out, which happens slowly, he’s taken at first for a huckster and a charlatan, but he’s neither. Not once does he push his product (which comes in the form of colored liquids in glass vials), nor does he promise the sun, moon, and stars. When prospective customers approach him, he asks what they’d like to dream, decides whether he can help, and, if the answer is yes, mixes his elixirs for them, offering a money-back guarantee.

Robert’s an itinerant psychologist, in other words, and the town needs his services. Animosities and untapped desires abound, none of which must be thought of, or, heaven forbid, spoken about. Indirectly, Robert encourages his customers, who include the lovelorn, frustrated, bereft, ambitious, and heartbroken, to feel what has long lurked inside them.
Not everybody believes him when he explains that dreams come from within and can’t predict the future, only provide a test version of it. They think he’s selling what they don’t have but can somehow acquire.

I love this premise and what Watson does with it. She’s made Robert a prophet of desire, and beneath his tolerant, wise exterior lies a deep shame and, perhaps, moral cowardice. He represents the notion that desire alone never hurts; it’s what you do with it that counts. I agree wholeheartedly, but many people don’t, and Watson’s fictional town is no exception, starting with the preacher, who believes Robert does Satan’s work.

Consequently, despite the liberation that many customers experience from their dreams, you sense that Robert will wear out his welcome, and you may even guess how that unfolds. Nevertheless, the journey here matters more than the destination, for The Dream Peddler fairly glows with feeling, a narrative as irresistible as I’ve read in a long while. With great subtlety, Watson renders the complexities of small-town rural life, while modernity licks around the edges, scaring some and enticing others.

I said the novel takes place in the early 1900s, but the only substantial clue is the lone automobile in town, a Ford belonging to the doctor, presumably a Model T. The way in which a few characters itch to see the world while others prefer to keep it at bay depicts a state of mind about to change: the twentieth century and its marvels and tragedies.

It’s hard to believe that The Dream Peddler is a first novel. Even without the sure-handed characterizations and storytelling, the prose would suggest an experienced pen.

Reading the name Robert Owens, I couldn’t help think of Robert Owen, the nineteenth-century Welsh industrialist and social reformer who founded a short-lived utopian socialist community in Indiana. Does Watson’s Robert have a utopian vision of desire? Unfortunately, yes. ( )

"The Dream Peddler unfolds like a gorgeous poem, leading us deep into the lives of its characters and exploring the vast underground legacy of our own desires." ~ Rene Denfeld, author of The Child Finder and The Butterfly Girl (coming October, 2019)

I was fortunate to receive an early copy of The Dream Peddler, the debut novel by Martine Fournier Watson, from the library marketing folks at Penguin Random House. It has a lovely review from Rene Denfeld, an author whom I admire. The premise sounds so unique: a traveling salesman in the early twentieth century, who has the unusual ability to create dreams, settles temporarily in a farming community one winter right around the time that a young boy goes missing.

The Dream Peddler, known as Robert Owens, is an enigmatic character. We don't know much about where he's been or where he's going or what drives him to do what he does: selling dreams that he is able to concoct with his vast stores of mysterious tinctures. The community is suspicious at first about something that seems like a ruse; however, one satisfied customer after another reinforces the validity of the dream peddler's potions. But the dreams sometimes reveal things that are not entirely expected, or wanted. And when one person knows so many of the secret desires of others, there can be a heavy price to pay.

There is a thread of sadness in this beautifully written tale that weaves its way through the narrative, leaving your heart at once less and more full than it was before. One character in the book meaningfully states, "Sadness is like an ocean. It must move in and out." And the book flows in just this way, ocean-like, with the waves of the story ebbing and flowing. Although darker than what I usually choose to read, I don't regret the time spent with these authentic, richly drawn characters and their struggles to understand and experience their inward desires through the dreams they purchase from the Dream Peddler.

And I asked myself this often while reading: what dream would I choose, given such a choice?

Thoughtful Reading.

*possible trigger for those with young children* ( )

Similes of the sort found in "horrible similes" lists. (eg, a fog like chalkboard brushes banged together; the inside of her mouth was fuzzy like a wet mouse). Some attempts at pastoral scenery descriptions, many using colour, but the characters were mostly stock and I felt no connections. The plotlines were not very innovative or unexpected, the dream peddling uninspiring. Trite and a quick read I wish I hadn't. ( )

A leisurely and dreamy story about life, grief, and expectations in a small American farming town, early in the twentieth century when dreaming was still an unexplained aspect of daily life. The plot is anchored on a mother whose child goes missing and a traveling salesman who claims he can mix potions that allow the purchaser to dream anything he or she desires. Often sad but also a beautifully atmospheric and magical read with a large cast of compelling characters. ( )

I really enjoyed this book. I think the concept was fascinating as I really liked the small town feel.

*I received a free copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.* ( )