The Dream Merchant

by HOVING, ISABELVELMANS, HESTER

• ISBN13: 9780763628802
• ISBN10: 0763628808
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2005-10-11
• Publisher: Candlewick

Summary

Winner of the Netherlands' most prestigious children's book award, this epic adventure quest draws readers deep into a collective dream world and sweeps them along on a riveting journey through a reimagined past. "They're going to send you on a sales trip and it'll be the death of you I know what's going on at Gippart. You're their guinea pig." Josh Cope is a bit of a dreamer . . . who sometimes steals things. Otherwise, he's just your average boy. So why is an international corporation calling him in the middle of the night, insisting that he come and work for them? Why would they be so convinced that Josh is the key to conquering their new market the past? Drawn into this astonishing, whirlwind adventure, Josh soon finds himself in the middle of a nightmare, caught in a place between dreams and reality. For Josh and his friends to find their way back, they must follow a trail that takes them right into the very heart of the human imagination and to the furthest ends of time itself.

Author Biography

ISABEL HOVING was born in Amsterdam. She began her career as a secondary-school teacher, during which time she became very active in the Dutch women's movement. She eventually gave up her job to study literary theory full-time and spent some months in Senegal, West Africa, for a research project — an experience that gave her a completely different perspective on the world and that she describes as a turning point in her life. Now a lecturer at Leiden University, Isabel Hoving lives with her partner and son in Amsterdam.


HESTER VELMANS has translated a number of novels from Dutch into English, including THE LILY THEATER by Lulu Wand and Renate Dorrestein's A HEART OF STONE, which won the Vondel Prize for Dutch Translation. In addition, she has contributed to her parents' wartime memoirs - EDITH'S STORY by Edith Velmans and LONG WAY BACK TO THE RIVER KWAI by Loet Velmans — and has written a children's novel, ISABEL OF THE WHALES.

Table of Contents

PART I -- HE IS CALLED
Gadgets	3	(17)
The Associates	20	(17)
The Dawning of the World	37	(19)
The Traders' Trial	56	(35)
PART II -- THE EXPEDITION
The Assignment	91	(29)
The Teeth of the Inelesi	120	(35)
A Chink in Time	155	(27)
Jericho	182	(19)
PART III -- DRUMMERS AND THIEVES
Waves, Wraiths, Wolves	201	(31)
Royal Blue	232	(32)
Deception, Betrayal and Apple Pie	264	(34)
The Thief Who Used His Eyes	298	(41)
PART IV -- THE ROAD TO THE TEMBE
The Dove of Light	339	(36)
Three Pigs in a Rich Lather	375	(39)
Josh Alone	414	(33)
The Deep Valleys of the Night	447	(34)
Higher, Higher, Higher	481	(28)
PART V -- SATURA'S MAW
What the Wind Blew In	509	(31)
The Hurricane of the World	540	(26)
Satura's Maw	566	(33)
Final Reckoning	599	(28)
A Seer in the Kitchen	627	(4)
Characters	631	(1)
Acknowledgments	632

Excerpts

Gadgets. It was all because he loved gadgets. When he looked back later on, Josh decided that was how it had started. Which wasn't far wrong: if he hadn't been so intrigued, Josh would have slammed the door in their faces right from the start, and the probably nothing would have happened. Why did they have to pick on him, of all people, to be the hero of their lousy adventures? He was just an ordinary boy — expect for four things.

Four things. First, he was a collector, and quite a good one. He knew exactly how to organize all his stuff so he could find things easily, and so his parents didn't want to dump it all in the dustbin every few months. Mostly he collected useful things, like solar torches that also worked as a compass, whistle and penknife; but he also had shelves piled high with rusty bits of metal, skulls and skeletons, bunches of locks, picklocks and keys, computer games that no longer worked, and all sorts of tools and electrical devices. Second, he could fall asleep wherever and whenever he wanted. Third, he could always remember his dreams. Which could be a pain, especially when it was a nightmare, and then he'd go around all day with a sinking feeling there was something after him. And fourth: he was a thief.

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DREAM MERCHANT by Isabel Hoving. Translated by Hester Velmans. Copyright (c) 2005 by Isabel Hoving. Published by Candlewick Press, Inc., Cambridge, MA.

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Excerpted from Dream Merchant by Isabel Hoving
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