About this title: In a haunting story that tiptoes between reality and imagination, a lonely, sensitive woman and a damaged, angry boy face their own histories and discover what they can be to one another, renewed by the strength that comes from a tiny, caring creature they will never see.
Note: This is a general synopsis. Each listing is described below.
Binding: Hardcover
Publisher: Houghton Mifflin Books for Children
Date Published: 2006
ISBN-13:9780618685509ISBN:0618685502
Description: A wonderful copy with some minor edgewear to the cover. Dust Jacket has some edgewear present. -, Hard Cover, Very Good / Very Good. read more
Binding: Hardcover
Publisher: Houghton Mifflin Books for Child
Date Published: 2006
ISBN-13:9780618685509ISBN:0618685502
Description: Good in Good jacket. 326-Y Ex-library. Books rated "Good" may have some notes, underlining, or highlighting. These books also may contain the previous owner's name, stamp, sticker, or gift inscription, or may be library discards. read more
Description: Acceptable. Former Library book. Shows definite wear, and perhaps considerable marking on inside. Shipped to over one million happy customers. Your purchase benefits world literacy! read more
Description: Good. Shows some signs of wear, and may have some markings on the inside. Shipped to over one million happy customers. Your purchase benefits world literacy! read more
Binding: Hardcover
Publisher: Houghton Mifflin Books for Children
Date Published: 2006-04-24
ISBN-13:9780618685509ISBN:0618685502
Description: Acceptable. Some damage to the cover but integrity still intact, binding slightly damaged but integrity still intact, possible writing in margins, possible underlining and highlighting of text. read more
Binding: Hardcover
Publisher: Houghton Mifflin Books for Children
Date Published: 2006-04-24
ISBN-13:9780618685509ISBN:0618685502
Description: Very good. Very minimal damage to the cover (no holes or tears, only minimal scuff marks), in some instances dust jackets are not included, no missing pages, minimal to no highlighting/under. read more
Description: Good. 073933560X Former library item may have library binding and show stamps, stickers or other marks. Items not meeting quality expectations may be returned. Due to the large scale of our operation, we do not have access to the specific contents/condition of our items. read more
Description: Good. 073933560X Former library item may have library binding and show stamps, stickers or other marks. Items not meeting quality expectations may be returned. Due to the large scale of our operation, we do not have access to the specific contents/condition of our items. read more
Description: Good. 0786289473 Former library item may have library binding and show stamps, stickers or other marks. Items not meeting quality expectations may be returned. Due to the large scale of our operation, we do not have access to the specific contents/condition of our items. read more
"Gossamer is a fantasy novel by Lois Lowry. This story is about Littlest one, a dream giver in training who is assigned to the house of an elderly woman with a dog, who has taken in an angry boy named John as foster child. John has had a history of being abused by his father. Littlest is part of a small group of dream givers. By touching, they gather fragments such as words, colors, and sounds, combine them to from dreams to humans and sometimes pets. The giving of dreams is called bestowal. This group of dream givers often fights off sinisteed, those who give off nightmares. Littlest learns to take care of John, as she struggles to find happy memories to put in his dreams, and protect him from nightmares. In the end, John loses his anger and littlest is reassigned although she wants to remain assigned to him. I see a text to world connection here, as John has been the victim of an abusive father. So many kids today come from a world of abuse. Many are in foster homes, other aren't, and never admit to the abuse. I was happy to see John lose his anger. Many abused people today have difficulty with this. I rate this book 3, because it dealt with too much abuse for me. I would recommend this book for those who enjoy fantasy novels."
"I just pecked a few thoughts out on my iPod. And then fleshed them out a little. Gossamer may have one of the most apt titles of any book ever written. It's gentle, soft, soothing. I've never read any other Lois Lowry, but her other books at least sound more interesting than this one. She tends to overuse adverbs and said synonyms, which no one notices as a problem until they read it. I would actually read about someone saying something, over announcing, shouting, etc. Sometimes it seems clumsy because she often adds a word too many. Doesn't feel real. It feels jilted, archaic. Especially the dream-givers. Of course, they are fantastical, they aren't supposed to, but I think the other characters are. Or are supposed to, I think. The abused child story seems a little easy. Of course my heart goes out to the child . . . I'm human, but hasn't that story been done for the exact same effect a thousand times. That's not to intimate it isn't effective. It is. It's just not all that original. I read this because it was a William Allen White book. And it seems like a bit of a miss. The William Allen White committee from the outside seems to be a bunch of old ladies. And that seems to describe this book. It seems like an old lady book. Nice, simple, nostalgic, non-threatening. I don't want to pigeonhole old ladies, but they do it to YA books all the time. This book was ok. It wasn't bad. It wasn't good. But Lowry has been popular at our middle school lately, because they are reading The Giver. I wonder what they'd think of this one?"
"it's a good childrens book. Good to read if you have an afternoon (or for most people an hour or two since I'm a slow reader) it short. there were a few good quotes.
1. "silently, following the sequence exactly, Littlest One bestowed a dream for the first time."
2. "All right." She fluttered back near him, then stopped, suddenly, examining her own self. "my goodness!" she excalimed. "I'm not transparent anymore!" She peered at her own ar, then lifted a leg and looked careglly at that as well. "I can't see through me! Can you?" she asked him, and thrust her arm into his face. "Can you see through me?"
"No. You're becoming somewhat solid. You're filling in," he explained.
"What fills me?" she asked, staring still at her arm.
"Everything that you're a part of. Your own story fills you"
3. "I feel terribly sad," Littlest One confided, "about the boy, and aobut the filling-in."
"Quite so. Change means leaving things behind, and that's alwasy sad....""
"According to Lois Lowry, dreams happen in ways you might not expect. There are tiny fairy-like creatures that collect fragments of our lives and memories from the objects around us, which they put together in new ways and then give to us as we lay sleeping. Everyone who dreams has been visited by a dream giver. In Gossamer, Littlest One is a new dream giver and she's learning how to collect and assemble fragments. She's got a hard task ahead of her, though, as her human person has a lot of unhappy memories and not many good associations - these are the kinds of bad feelings that "Sinesteeds" are attracted to (they bring people nightmares instead of dreams). Littlest and her mentor, Thin Elderly, must do their best to bring good dreams to the old woman and her new foster child, John.
This was a sweet book, very short, with comforting words about dreams. While there is some suspense surrounding the Sinesteeds, Littlest and Thin Elderly aren't ever in any huge danger. Children who read this should be reassured about their own dreams and nightmares and will likely find this a magical and enjoyable read. As an adult reading this, I found it a little too brief for my taste - there's not enough time to get truly attached to any of the characters or to the world that the dream givers (and Sinesteeds) inhabit. So, while I thought, "Well, that was nice," it didn't make a lasting impression on me."
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