Dream Weavers: Night of the Scary Fairies
Annabelle Sami, illustrated by Forrest Burnett
Little Tiger

The night before going into Year 5 Tito starts having strange dreams. He’s on a clifftop in his Spiderman pyjamas to see a field full of strange tiny beings flitting about, one of which seems to take a chomp at his big toe.

The following morning, Tito’s teacher asks him to look after a new pupil, Neena, from Pakistan. Trying his best to engage her in conversation, Tito gets virtually nothing from her the entire day, though other members of his class start acting strangely At home he feels he’s failed in his task and researches the Chitral region of Pakistan, Neena’s erstwhile home, discovering that it’s rich in folklore.

Next day in school he tells Neena about his peculiar dreams and this gets her talking. She tells him about the jinn of her hometown – the paris – and on hearing this Tito says he’s seen something similar in his dreams. Neena asks him to draw whatever symbol comes into his head, first on paper and then before he goes to bed, on his hand. That night the two meet in Tito’s dream wherein he’s told they are both Dreamweavers.
For the next few nights Tito and Neena meet in their dreams, but during the day, Tito is tired and although his friends Tiffany and Murray begin to get friendly towards the new girl, he doesn’t
take much notice of what’s happening to them until he talks further with Neena. She suggests they try going into Tiffany and Murray’s dreams to find out what is wrong and so be able to help them.

Before long, the Dream Team as they call themselves, discover that the paris are playing tricks on Tiffany and Murray, changing their personalities.

At school they see that the rest of the pupils also have new identities. How is this possible?

In their dream travels, the two children encounter a scary man: Neena’s uncle, whom she says is a Dark Weaver, a power-hungry Dreamweaver gone rogue. Now a new plan is needed, first to undo the spell put on the paris, so they revert to their benevolent ways and then to return things to normal in the waking world.

The story ends with Neena introducing Tito to her family members, and a pact is made to put paid to the activities of Dark Weavers. That though, must wait for the next book.

Annabelle Sami certainly transports the reader to other worlds in this tale and despite some scary moments, she keeps things light so child readers are unlikely so have nightmares. I love the way Neena and Tito’s friendship develops and Forrest Burdett’s illustrations provide further details, especially of the characters’ feelings.