I give this five stars under its influence. Only time will tell if it lives up to them, by growing in my mind or drawing me back to re-read.

I have always loved Lloyd Alexander's writing, and this, his last book, seems to stand among his greater works. Golden Dream has the inimitable style, the ragtag companions and the innocent romance that characterize Lloyd Alexander in general, but it also has a thread of deeper meaning and seeking that is characteristic of my favorite Alexander works, the Chronicles of Prydain. Where Prydain is concerned, more or less, with growing up and forming/finding the self, my first impression is that The Golden Dream is about what you want in life and why, what's worth striving for, with a side-current on what art does or attempts.

It's definitely its own book, however. Carlo is not Taran, and his companions will not be familiar to Prydain wanderers. Carlo is his own brand of feckless, self-deprecating dreamer ("I never had much occasion to use my conscience. I never suspected I actually owned one.") and his friends have their own outlooks on the world. Carlo's journey twists and wriggles appealingly, and took one turn at the end I did not predict, but which felt beautiful and right.

If I were asked to think of a negative about it, I'd say that the Arabian-inflected world of Keshavar is spun out of stories and icons and may contain a few stereotypes. However, the book makes a sharp nod of acknowledgment to that with its inclusion of the book of tales, more or less the Arabian Nights, which Carlo is reading at the beginning. Moreover, Lloyd Alexander's books consistently are woven out of dreams and legends of places on our Earth, all over our Earth. He is careful to place these worlds outside our own, and I do not think that a child reading this book would try to match its characters and cultures to the real world. I'm reaching for a negative, and that's the only one I find.

The stakes here may be a little higher, and the dark a little darker, than in, say, The Marvelous Misadventures of Sebastian. A child who is mature enough to read Taran Wanderer and The High King would be perfect for this book.

The world of the book is thoroughly imagined, the characters charming, and the story vintage Alexander. It would be marvelous read aloud, but however you read it, mind the cliff-hangers or you'll be up past your bedtime! I'm glad I hoarded this book for a year so I would have it to look forward to. I was not disappointed. It made me smile, it made me think, it made me cry, and it gave me the heart-glow that comes of being told a great story. ( )

Arabian Nights

recalled in adventure of

boy seeking fortune.

Perhaps the greatest weakness of The Golden Dream of Carlo Chuchio is that it is written from a first-person point of view, lessening the suspense one might feel whenever its protagonist finds himself in dire circumstances. Such an objection is merely a matter of personal taste, however. Admirers of Lloyd Alexander's works will find much to enjoy in the course of this, his last story.

The time period the story is set in is unspecified, though it would be no surprise if our titular character had been a contemporary of Marco Polo. Carlo begins his story employed by his uncle, an accountant in the Italian region of Campania--though the city of Magenta in which they live is not to be confused with the real Italian city of that name, located in the north at the base of the Alps.

Carlo is given a book of presumably Arabian tales by a mysterious stranger, as well as a map which was hidden in the book's binding. The map points to a fortress of lost treasure, which Carlo's intuition tells him must be real. So he sets out across the sea, determining to follow the Road of Golden Dreams which lead from the eastern Mediterranean shore to Cathai (China).

Upon reaching land, he makes the acquaintance of a trio of characters who accompany him on his journey: Baksheesh, a self-serving, slick-talking and thick-skinned street urchin who volunteers his services as Carlo's camel-puller and never uses an appellation twice. Shira, a girl of half-Arab and half-Oriental blood seeking to know what became of her home and family. And Salomon, a wandering philosopher of the finest Socratean tradition, who in temperament and appearance brings to mind Shepherd Book of the TV series Firefly, but is an even match for Alexander's own Rhun son of Rhuddlum in curiosity.

A colorful cast of supporting characters help or hinder them on their journey, a journey which Salomon reminds them is just as important as their destinations. In their own ways, they each encounter bandits, eccentrics, serendipitous twists of fate, visions, intrigue, starvation, beauty, love, and more. The moments of self-discovery each character experiences are well earned and quite satisfying.

Going into the book with the awareness that it was Lloyd Alexander's last, it evokes some rather poignant feelings. The tone can be found of a master storyteller in the twilight of his life, if one looks for it. Unlike the brash ambition and high ideals of Taran, Alexander's main protagonist in his superlative Prydain Chronicles, Carlo Chuchio's story is told by a man not seeking a climactic finale to his life's work, but was simply content to tell the kind of story he told best through decades of experience. One could appropriately liken them to the two horn concertos of Richard Strauss; the first written by a talented youth ready to share his great ideas with the world, and the second written by the seasoned composer who has little to prove, but still something worth saying.

Rife with a warm humor, The Golden Dream of Carlo Chuchio thus serves as an uplifting coda to a great writer's body of works. May all who read it realize their own pleasant, golden dreams. ( )

Naive and bumbling Carlo, his shady camel-puller Baksheesh, and Shira, a girl determined to return home, follow a treasure map through the deserts and cities of the infamous Golden Road, as mysterious strangers try in vain to point them toward real treasures.