A Dream Apart [Kindle Edition]

Rudolf Kerkhoven (Author)

Editorial Reviews

Product Description

THE NEW NOVEL FROM THE AUTHOR OF THE YEAR WE FINALLY SOLVED EVERYTHING

Elliot Bergeron feels like he's been here before...

Elliot Bergeron has just finished university and is falling for a young woman.  Elliot Bergeron is a disheartened thirty year-old elementary school teacher counting down the years to his pension. Elliot Bergeron's life is wide open.  Elliot Bergeron's life is sealed shut.  Elliot Bergeron has dreams of his future.  Elliot Bergeron has dreams of his past.  Elliot Bergeron is living two parts of his own life at the same time and doesn't know who he is, who he loves, what he controls, what will happen next, or even what happened before.

With an ear for dialogue and a penchant for wry humor, Kerkhoven's writing is reminiscent of Nick Hornby but with the attitude of Dave Eggers.   Utilizing a narrative that is linear and yet cyclical, A Dream Apart is an original and surreal drama about love and tragedy with a comedic gloss.   Like The Year We Finally Solved Everything, it defies simple genre classification.

Product Details

• Format: Kindle Edition
• File Size: 502 KB
• Publisher: Bowness Books; First edition (November 28, 2011)
• Sold by: Amazon Digital Services
• Language: English
• ASIN: B006FRAUZW
• Text-to-Speech: Enabled
• Lending: Enabled
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #314,349 Paid in Kindle Store (See Top 100 Paid in Kindle Store)

More About the Author

Over the last thirteen years, Rudolf Kerkhoven has greatly improved his typing skills. He is now able to type quickly through a rather unorthodox hybrid of the prescribed home-row technique and good old hunt-and-peck. As of the summer of 2011, his estimated WPM (words per minute) is 65, although it appears doubtful that this will improve any further. Rudolf Kerkhoven is pretty impressed with this. That's more than a word a second.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Highly Recommend!, December 8, 2011

By 

Ida - See all my reviews

This review is from: A Dream Apart (Kindle Edition)

"A Dream Apart" is a very impressive book. The author must have had a very clear vision of what he wanted to create when he sat down to begin writing this novel. There are two main stories threading themselves throughout this book, as told by the main character, Elliot Bergeron. One thread follows Elliot experiencing his current life and could very much be described as a fairly tragic, though light-hearted and humorous love story.

WARNING! SPOILERS AHEAD!

We meet Elliot while he is in university training to be a teacher and follow him as he meets his girlfriend who becomes his wife. Intertwined throughout this story, Elliot starts having very real dreams about his future. I know, sounds kind of sci-fi but it isn't in any way. On the contrary, Elliot's dreams are fairly mundane but begin resonating with him as he realizes that his wife does not ever appear in any of the dreams. He realizes that at some point his wife must die but he does not know when or where this will happen. The most appealing parts of this book come when Elliot's future dreams begin coming true as time passes in Elliot's current / past life. As Elliot becomes increasingly paranoid about his wife's impending death, as well as intensely curious about his future life, the author manipulates our experience and we begin to find ourselves questioning which of Elliot's worlds is the reality. The author is seamless in his transitions between Elliot's two roles; one as an insecure (albeit witty) beginning teacher experiencing the reality of life post-university, the other as a thirty-something, adequate teacher mourning the death of his wife.

Each chapter jumps back and forth between these two plots, always making you want to read 'just one more chapter...'. Throughout it all, the author maintains some very quick wit in the conversations that take place between characters, making what could be a very confusing and tragic story an incredibly enjoyable and worthwhile read. Highly recommended.