Product Description

It's just before dawn. The Dream Collector's truck has broken down and the neighborhood is overrun with dreams. Zachary must help round them up -- or else they will become real. The Dream Collector is a captivating, beautifully illustrated tale of a boy's dream-tinged adventure -- and proof that dreams really can come true!

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #1257053 in Books
• Published on: 1999-02-01
• Original language: English
• Binding: Hardcover
• 32 pages

From School Library Journal
Kindergarten-Grade 2-The Dream Collector, an official charged with rounding up people's dreams every morning, is an eccentric old geezer with a broken-down truck and no toolbox. As luck would have it, Zachary, the child protagonist, is out and about, and after introducing himself, the man explains that he must get cracking in order to repair the vehicle and gather up all of the dreams before dawn ("Once sunlight touches them, they're here to stay," he says). Zachary scares up some tools and sets about gathering together an assortment of ethereal creatures, including a dragon, a knight, and a zebra. When the boy finds it impossible to herd a sheepdog, just like the one he's been asking his parents for, into the truck, he and the Dream Collector strike a deal to bring this whimsical story to a satisfying end. The Daniels' vivid mixed-media artwork adds to the rollicking fun. The idea of a person who can make one's fondest dreams come true is sure to tickle the imaginations of children.
Mollie Bynum, formerly at Chester Valley Elementary School, Anchorage, AK
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Kirkus Reviews
From readers' early glimpses of Zachary, the red-haired, bespectacled moppet hero of this story, standing on the edge of an orange toilet seat in his acid green jammies, they'll know this is no ordinary tale. Zachary finds two zebras and a shaggy dog drinking from the birdbath quite early one Saturday morning, and a white-bearded codger out front trying to start his truck. The codger is the Dream Collector, who gathers folks' dreams before dawn each day to keep them from becoming real when the sunlight touches them. Zachary brings him tools and tries to round up the stray dreams; zebras, pirates, a knight, and a dragon are loaded into the truck. The Dream Collector gets it started just in timebut allows the dream-conjured shaggy dog, with ``eyes like chocolate kisses'' to stay and become Zachary's real dog. Children might find the thought of dreams becoming real either delightful or creepy, but it is hard not to be charmed by the illustrations, with their deep palette of greens, reds, and blues; the fully realized shapes of Zachary and the Dream Collector and the truck are reassuring next to the more evanescent forms of the dragon and the pirates. As Zachary bounds up to his parents' bedroom with the dog in tow, young readers will have a fine time thinking about what happens next. (Picture book. 3-7) -- Copyright ©1999, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

Review
It is hard not to be charmed by the illustrations. (Kirkus Reviews )

Customer Reviews

Vivid, pleasing yarn
Vivid illustrations keep pace with the tale of young Zachary who encounters a couple of zebras and a shaggy sheepdog at the birdbath early one morning. Then he notices an old man working rather frantically on a broken-down truck, and so he meets the Dream Collector, a bigger than life taskmaster charged with gathering everyone's dreams each morning to keep them from becoming real.

Zachary assembles his hodge-podge collection of tools to try and help the old fellow get his truck running, but is soon dispatched to round up the straying dreams, a motley collection of mythical and real animals and beings.

One dream, the very one Zachary vividly recalls from the previous night, eludes captures, and when the Dream Collector gets his truck running in the nick of time, he rewards his helper by letting Zachary to keep the shaggy dog he so wants. And so we are reminded again, that maybe some dreams can come true, a befitting message for children to hear once more.