I dreamt that I was in a bookstore last night, not an unusual experience for me by any means. According to my dream, it was a store that I'd been in before, although in reality it doesn't exist. The store sold mostly newer books, comics, and magazines, but under a table of magazines I found a box of older books. Such an experience in real life always thrills me, the thought of what treasures I might discover, and this was true in my dream as well. Eagerly, I pulled the box out and pawed through it.
I found one book that I was very happy with. Now, I'm a big fan of Sword and Planet fiction, like Burroughs wrote with his John Carter of Mars series, and my find was an old Sword and Planet novel that I'd never seen before. It wasn't by Burroughs, or Lin Carter, or Alan Burt Akers (Ken Bulmer), who I knew very well, but was by someone who'd be relatively unknown outside of the field. I can't recall if I even knew the author's name in the dream, but it seems like it was probably by someone like Charles Nuetzel or Mike Sirota. I don't remember the title either, although it had the word "Mond" in it. Perhaps something like "Swords of Mond."
I do remember the cover. It had a yellowish-brown background, with the title in big black letters at the top, and it showed a desert scene of sand and rock with a man riding a cat-beast that looked much like a sabertooth. The man had a lance in his right hand, with a red pennant tied to the head that blew out in an unseen wind. I'd love to read this book, although I suppose to do so I'd have to write it myself.
Does anyone else here ever dream of bookstores and the treasures they contain?
I have had dreams like that, very close to what you describe. They are always pleasant, kind of sad to wake up from in fact.
ReplyDeleteIt must be one of those shared dreams for book lovers, much like all actors at one time or another dream of being on stage but not knowing their lines.