[Feanor of the Peredhil]

I have to agree with Form on the dream issue.

Before I ever set foot in a writing classroom and before I ever considered myself a writer-in-training, I read. I taught myself to read before I was even in school because my mum was tired of reading that "just one more chapter?" every single night.

And every single time I've run across "And then she woke up" or anything remotely resembling it, it has completely ruined things for me. The quickest example to come to mind was my most recent encounter: Terry Pratchett's The Wee Free Men. About half-way through the book, his main character is busy battling creatures under orders from the Queen of the Elves and all and I was caught up in the story and most suddenly, Tiffany woke up. I came disturbingly close to closing the book and being done with it right there.

Every reader of fantasy, or really anything, engages in suspended disbelief. It is a knowing decision to ignore the fact that what you are reading is total bologna and to let yourself get caught up in the story with the mindset that of course it is real and the outcomes of every situation are completely and totally important to your life and future well-being.

As soon as you are told that it was all a dream, the fantasy world that you have allowed yourself to be captured in comes crashing down like a card castle in the wind and you feel like a fool. Of course, it was just a story. Even inside the story, it was just a story. I let myself get caught up in something that isn't even a pragmatic reality for the characters; double the fool am I.

When you allow for suspended disbelief and you reach a point where suddenly you're informed that you didn't need it, it's like being told that you were wasting your time and imagination. It feels like a trick played by the writer.

It leaves a sour taste in my mouth.

My most recent "official" writing teacher said on the first day of class that it weakens your story to qualify it like that, and I agree. It's too much like breaking the rules. If your story is a dream, what is there to stop you from incorporating anything that unconscious thought might? If it is all merely a dream, where are the rules of the universe you have created that stop you from killing the mood? I am aware that each writer here has such control that s/he wouldn't let the fact that it is both dream and reality manipulate the plot, but I can't find it in myself to be comfortable with taking the easy way out.

And for me, making it a dream is the easy way and I've long since come to the conclusion that if something isn't painfully difficult, I am, or we are, doing it wrong.

Edit: Upon review, this might come off as preachy or worse... It is merely meant to state my opinion of the revelations thus far that I have encountered of an entire story having been a dream. Feel absolutely free to completely ignore me. If the rest of the team likes the dream solution (which is certainly a creative one) to translator's conceit, I will happily step down and never bring it up again.