Dreamtime: Shadowsong

SHADOWSONG by Jenny Jones
Dreamtime Series
Dolphin (Orion Children's Books) - 2000
ISBN: 1858817080 - Paperback
Fantasy
Teen / Young Adult

Reviewed by Rachel Hyde, MyShelf.com
Buy a Copy

Dreamtime is a series of books aimed at teenagers. Each short novel is a different entry into the twilight world where anything can happen Shadowman lurks, waiting to trap the unwary. Each is a separate stand-alone story. In this one Gilly has just landed the lead part in her school’s musical production of the myth of Orpheus. But the new drama teacher is not all he seems – Willie Wyatt is in fact Raq, the reptilian servant of the Shadowman who wants Gilly to sing for him for eternity and bring back life to his dead realm where nothing is real, only illusion. When she loses Wyatt’s wooden mask to the river after a push by a jealous friend he invites her instead to come to his house and paint a mural on the wall. But why does his house look as though nobody lives there?

The perennial themes of the angst of teenage love and broken friendships, parents on the verge of remarrying and money problems form a part of this novel but this is not actually what the story is about so it is a sideline rather than the book’s reason for existence. A little more mystery and some more lively descriptions would have made it spookier but I enjoyed the parallels between the myth of Orpheus and the tale of Gilly and her perils. A brief and lively read, if a little thin in places.