The Otherworld

After finishing reading Book 6 and Book 7 of the Harry Potter series, I began searching for other "escapist" stories and novels.

I have bought books 1, 2 and 3 of Michael Scott's series, The Secrets of the Immortal Nicholas Flamel, who as I've learned is a real life alchemist (and not just a fictional character of the Harry Potter books as I first surmised. I am now on book 2 of this series but stopped (since the author is still writing the 4th book and is yet to conceptualize the story of the 5th and 6th book - which means I will have to wait a few more years before the series is finally concluded).

Because of my Harry Potter fever, I began collecting books again (with time to read). I am now collecting the Dune books (I have read Dune, Dune Messiah and Children of Dune in mass paperback - I now have hardcover copies of the House Atreides, and the Butlerian Jihad), the Sword of Truth series of Terry Goodkind, and the third book of Jonathan Stroud's Bartimeus trilogy. I am contemplating buying the Charlie Bone books of Jenny Nimo but the work seems to be a shameless rip off of Harry Potter.

Last Sunday, I bought "Necronomicon: The Best Weird Stories of H.P. Lovecraft". I have read only the first few stories of the book. The book is full of stories about a cities, deities and civilizations that came before men, now long gone. The stories do not result in outright terror but I can feel a somehow different atmosphere when reading the stories.

Last night (or very early this morning), I dreamt of a series of "weird" dreams. I woke up groggily but decided to fall back to sleep again. [The dreams, though horrific in nature seems to non-threatening to me - in most of my dreams, especially those between sleeping and waking moments, I realize (while am still asleep) that what is happening is only part of a dream and that whatever happens in the dream, however terrifying, is only a dream.]

One dream I remember in particular. It is about a cemetery and people comes to visit. In my dream, I can see the people and the spirits. The twist in this event is that the spirits in the cemetery do not leave the place, they remain there and search (more like trap) a living person to be their companion forver. The search happens every November 1 when people come to visit. I just remember someone (possibly me) seeing the spirits and running away from them, knowing what they're up to. The escape involves climbing and jumping from a coconut tree to a wall, then running to a lake/body of water and hurrying after a leaving ferry.

There are also parts of the series of dreams that involves my father, some scenes in a train that stops in a sort-of a ghost town (but where there are people) very near the aforementioned cemetery (or where the cemetery is located).

I'm now wondering whether it is wise to continue reading H.P. Lovecrafts horrific and fantastical tales of the macabre.

Maybe I'll just need to avoid reading the stories before going to sleep.