Module 8: Gossamer

Gossamer

by Lois Lowry 

Lowry, L. (2006). Gossamer.  Boston, MA: Houghton Mifflin.

Where do dreams come from?

Summary:

Several story lines are intertwined in Gossamer.  An elderly woman takes in a young boy who is abused.  A young woman works hard to turn her life around and regain custody of her only son.  A new dream-giver learns how to bestow dreams on the inhabitants of the house to which she is assigned.  Evil nightmare givers, sinisteeds, work against the dream-givers.  Each story line crosses paths delicately to weave a tender tale of a new dream-giver and her mission to heal the wounds and heartache of the young boy and old woman through their dreams using fragments of memories.  

Impressions:

Lois Lowry is one of my favorite authors.  All of her books are touching with themes that transcend place and time.  Gossamer is no exception.  Though a fantasy novel about dream creatures, deeper questions about the impact of memories, the affects of abuse and how one heals are beautifully woven into the story, which feels like a dream itself.  As a reader, I appreciate how Lowry makes no judgements here.  The boy's mother is portrayed with depth and sensitivity.  Even the sinisteeds, the evil dream-givers, are complex with a backstory.  It's a sensitive, mature read that packs a punch at times.    

Reviews:

From Kirkus Reviews starred:

Thin Elderly and Littlest One are dream-givers. They bestow dreams, using fragments collected from buttons, toys, photographs, shells and other personal objects that collect and hold memories over the years. The collected fragments become stories of the person to whom they belong, and as dreams they transmit restorative feelings of love, pride, happiness, companionship, laughter and courage. However, Sinisteeds are at work here, too, inflicting nightmares and undoing the careful work of the dream-givers. Readers familiar with The Giver will most appreciate Lowry's riff on the value of memories and dreams and the importance of the sad parts of our lives, too. For such a slim work, the characterizations of Thin Elderly and Littlest are strong-she the sprightly little girl learning her trade, he the bemused and patient elder. The prose is light as gossamer; the story as haunting as a dream. (Fiction. 10+)

Citation: Gossamer. (2006). Kirkus, 74(5), 235. 

From Horn Book Magazine:

Curious, unconventional Littlest One is a dream giver, an ethereal spirit who "bestows" dreams on humans by touching (very lightly; it's dangerous to "delve") items that contain pleasant memories, gathering these "fragments," and wafting them gently into sleepers' ears. Littlest One is apprenticed to Thin Elderly, whose dream-giving territory is a house belonging to a lonely but loving old woman who is fostering an angry, emotionally scarred eight-year-old boy. When a horde of Sinisteens, dream givers who've gone over to the dark side, bring the boy terrifying nightmares (graphically described) of his father's abuse, Littlest One fights back with healing fragments of the boy's triumphant at-bat in a baseball game, his attachment to the old woman's dog, the comfort of his favorite stuffed animal. Like Lowry's recent dystopic novels, this book is rife with symbolic names and weighty-sounding terms; and, like them, this book's meaning is all right there on the surface, barely related to character or plot. In fact, the humans are such stock characters that they might as well be named Troubled Boy, Wise Older Woman, and Single Mom Trying to Get Her Act Together. Lowry's touch here is hardly gossamer, but this allegorical novel doesn't require it: Lowry's distilled prose bypasses the particular and goes right to the universal.

Citation: Parravano, M. V. (2006). Gossamer. Horn Book Magazine, 82(4), 446. 

Library Activity:

One theme in this book is family diversity.  A discussion following this book could be focused on family dynamics.  The young boy in Gossamer is living with a foster mother until his mother can care for him again.  Many children have a hard time identifying with abuse or what may have led to the fracturing of a family.  Reading Gossamer and other books about nontraditional families or orphans can provide them with some experience and enable them to empathize with children in their school who may be going through a similar situation.