Dreamlands: Introduction
The concept of the Dreamlands fascinated me when I first encountered it some time in the late 1960s, although I’d already run into similar ideas from a vast range of other fantasy authors. Like so many Cthulhu Mythos readers I immediately began plotting stories set there, or set in the broader Mythos background. Some of the oldest stories are found in this volume, and were pretty much plotted out by the end of that decade. It was followed by many other ideas, most of which have mercifully been lost to time.
My original intent was just to have fun writing fiction, but after I'd written an awful lot I realized that while I was indeed writing stories I was really just describing a world. I hope that you will feel free to write your own fiction in that world, or role-play in it. Please read the Legal information (see footer) before you do, though.
The Prologue to Chapter 3 of the Book of Richard was written by David Farnell as part of the never-completed Kurotokage sourcebook project for the Call of Cthulhu RPG, and he owns full copyright.
Like the Dreamlands themselves, these Chronicles are in flux. They may morph at any time, minor or major, and an event occuring in a new story may trigger changes in past stories, or the fabric of the Dreamlands themselves.
Posts in the Dreamlands section are broken down into several books and a glossary, tagged appropriately. The Book of Richard should be read first, and the Book of Celephaïs after the Jake books. Notes, explanations and other information are tagged under Notes.
- The Book of Richard
- The Book of Jake, Vols. I and II
- The Book of Donn
- The Book of Chabra
- The Book of Celephaïs
- Notes
These Chronicles are based on the map of Dreamland created by Jason Thompson, and used with permission. My Dreamlands is completely different from his, but I had always intended these stories to take place in the Dreamlands, and when I saw his map I asked him if I could reference it instead of laboriously creating my own (far poorer) version of the same lands. While I have included more detail and a wider area than Jason, everything on his map is still valid in my Dreamlands. Much of his map can be viewed online, and a truly wonderful poster is available from Jason via his Shopify site:
