A good telling of a celtic myth. Nothing extraordinary but a good quick read ( )

never heard of before

...you may sleep now,
For Dream Angus leaps light across the heather,
And the name upon his lips is your name,
And the gifts that he bears are gifts for you...
-- Page 173, Dream Angus by Alexander McCall Smith

I found this book completely by random in the bargain section of the local Barnes & Noble. I wasn't even really looking in the bargain section, but this book caught my eye for some reason as we were walking by. I found myself picking it up to see what it was. And then I found myself buying it because it sounded interesting and for five bucks, why not?

Best random book buy EVAR. Here's the blurb from the inside flap.

Dreams to sell, fine dreams to sell

Dream Angus comes to you at night and bestows dreams--you may spot him skipping across the hills, his bag of dreams by his side. Just the sight of him may be enough for you to lose your heart, for he is also the god of love, youth, and beauty. Divine Angus is loved by all, but fated to love only the beautiful Caér, swan maiden of his own dreams.

Five exquisite fables of modern dreamers unfold alongside Angus's search for Caér. Mesmerically weaving together the tales of the Celtic Eros and his contemporary alter egos, Alexander McCall Smith unites dream and reality, leaving us to wonder: what is life, but the pursuit of our dreams?

This book is lovely. It's a light read at only 173 pages and it's quite well-written. The style of it is similar to that traditional kind of myth-telling voice with lots of long sentences and vague, but enchanting descriptions. That style can very easily get on my nerves and often deters me from reading books that are straight-up, pure folklore, but it works for me here.

As the blurb o' the flap indicates, this isn't a simple retelling of the mythical life of Angus, though part of it is that. Kind of interwoven into his story are the stories of people all over the world and in Scotland who live in non-specific, but more modern time periods. Their stories are of varying lengths and complexity, but most of them involve something about dreams. These stories are the story of a honeymooning couple, a story about two young brothers, a story about a boy who learns who his real father is, a story of a man who tends to the animals at a research center, and the story of a woman who leaves her cheating husband. The only one of these that I didn't really care for is the story about the boy learning about his real father and my quibble with it is that there is nothing about dreams in it.

My favorite of these stories is the one about the animal keeper at the research center in the chapter called "Is there a place for pigs there?" It's a sad, hopeful story and I think I loved it most for the whimsical descriptions of the pigs, which I have to share here as representative of why I really loved the writing.

[...] Pig Nineteen looked out at a world which she divided into edible and non-edible. The non-edible was of no interest to her, but she engaged with the edible passionately, sniffing it out with her moist, mucus-encrusted nose, scrabbling for it with her cloven feet, and gobbling it down with a grunting that could have been triumph, contentment or sorrow at the realisation that food was finite.
--Page 103, Dream Angus by Alexander McCall Smith

The little modern stories, instead of seeming out of place with the main story of Angus's life, actually complement it really well. The transition from the myth of Angus into the story of these modern people is never jarring and I think I wouldn't have liked this book nearly so much if it had just been the story of Angus's life or if it had just been those five stories of the modern world. They go together and make this what it is.

I've never read anything by Alexander McCall Smith, but if the rest of his stuff is as good as this, he might be well worth seeking out. I really enjoyed this and would highly recommend it to anybody who enjoys a touch of myth to their fiction. I'm glad I bought it as well as I think it'll be one of those I'll go back to and read again.

And now I'll leave you with one of my absolute favorite bits from Dream Angus because even though it's a sad part of a bittersweet story, it made me smile to think that pigs are so innocent and thoughtful.

Pig Twenty sat down and looked at the sky, as if puzzled, floored, by its sheer immensity. He might have thought, if he thought at all: is there a place for pigs there? Is that for pigs?
--Page 125-6, Dream Angus by Alexander McCall Smith ( )

[Dream Angus] by Alexander McCall Smith is his addition to the myth stories retold by modern authors. Angus is a Celtic God who brings dreams which are prophetic, and who is an active character in these stories. They are all bound together because of Angus, and some are set in ancient times and some are modern. I enjoy McCall Smith’s No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency stories, but I liked his writing better in this book. It’s sharper, deeper, and more interesting. ( )

A re-telling of Angus, a Celtic figure who was the son of the Dagda and a water spirit Boann. Angus comes in the night and bestows dreams and this tale is a mixture of the original myth and stories of people set in our current time. Boann is married to another man when Dagda sees her and desires her. After she becomes pregnant he leaves her but returns to take Angus when he is born against her wishes. When he grows into manhood he tricks his father out of his Kingdom and later falls in love with a woman he sees in a dream. She is someon unattainable who turns in to a swan for alternate years. The ending of Angus' story is beautiful and has the two finding happiness together.

The tale is interspersed with fragments and dreams of more modern people. The final story was my favourite and is of a woman whose husband has been having an affair. She leaves him and enters therapy. One night she dreams that she stands up to her husband who then reaches out to her saying he had long hoped she would come but was too afraid to ask her. Soon after she drives past their old house and he comes over to her and reaches for her through the car window. It was a beautiful tale and a lovely way to finish this enchanting short novel.

This is one of my favourites so far in the series and I am definitely interested in reading more of McCall Smith's writing. Recommended for anyone with a passion for mythology or a damn good story. ( )

Flitting in amongst the lives and dreams of modern day Irish folk, Angus, deliverer of dreams and igniter of passions and love, takes on the persona of a therapist, a tow-headed and simple-minded youth, or the ancient regalia as the son of the Dagda, the highest of the Irish deities. McCall Smith crafts a series of delightful short stories, rife with the connections between people and the failings therein. Whether describing the beautiful beginnings of a newlywed couple or the wrenching betrayal of a damaged marriage, he tells an engaging story.

Yet unlike precursors in the Canongate Myth series, the connections to the myth that beget this novel seems to hold a tenuous thread to the modernity of mythic experience that Smith never truly expounds upon. The mythic story arc, encasing the modern short stories, of the Dream Angus could be excised and leave a fine collection of short stories. I felt disappointed that the first Celtic exploration did not delve as deeply nor as soundly as the Greek tales. The myth was relegated to the hastily surmised binding offering a tenative connective tissue to the short stories, rather than the wellspring from whence they sprung.

The prose is lovely and the characters have feeling to them, but I engaged this novel hoping for the resonance of mythos to carry me to the ineffable realms of imagination and creativity, but alas the flight stopped lightly at a pleasurable yarn to wile away an afternoon, leaving me grasping at a loose thread yet to be woven into cloth. ( )

I really enjoyed this. I came across it by chance in a charity shop and as I have enjoyed Alexander McCall Smith in the past I bought it then and there. I didn't realise what it was.I love the story of Angus mac Og and Caer and so to find a volume based around this was enchanting. I think McCall Smith has captured the feel of the Irish/ Scottish story and manages to tie it in beautifully with the modern chapters. Lovely! ( )

Well, I did read [Dream Angus]. It was in the "ok" area for me until I got to the last chapter. This book has Smith interspersing the mythic story of Angus wih modern tales of people affected by dreams.

This tenth chapter I found very affecting with a lucid dream that resolves the mess a couple have gotten into. It brought up memories of dreams I've had and dreamwork I've done.

I might mention that dreams in this book function as an agent of change and not as a pyschological analysis of your life already lived, particularly the detritus from the previous day. ( )

Dream Angus is a beautifully written novel composed of delightfully written vignettes, both mythological and modern. Alexander McCall Smith, most famous for The No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency, employs the same bewitching narrative but with a new classic epic twist.
Dream Angus is one of the earliest of the Celtic deities, and one of the most beloved. Angus comes bounding over the heather with his bag of dreams to dispense to those who want them. He is lithe of foot and beautiful – as befits one who is also the Celtic Eros, the god of love, youth and beauty.

Angus is a playful trickster, given to frightening people and cattle. He will reveal to you in a dream your true love, if asked, and if in the mood. He is a romantic, and one of the main stories associated with him is his search for the young woman who had appeared to him in his dreams. Eventually he finds her, but she is under a spell which makes her assume the shape of a bird for a year. Angus changes himself into a swan and the two lovers fly off together.

In McCall Smith’s inimitable retelling of the myth, the setting is twentieth century Scotland. Angus is a psychotherapist who helps people understand their dreams, but there are limits to what he can reveal. Mesmerically weaving the modern day with the tales of the Celtic god, Alexander McCall Smith unites dream and reality, leaving us to wonder: what is life, but the pursuit of our dreams? ( )

http://tamaranth.blogspot.com/2007/11... ( )

am not all that familiar with Celtic mythology and had actually never heard of Angus (god of dreams and love), so I was a bit worried that some bits of the story would be lost on me...but I need not have worried. Dream Angus is a quite a wonderful retelling of this myth. After doing a bit of research, I find that McCall Smith has kept the bones from source material and dressed them up in contemporary garments and he has, I believe, done it a very likeable and compelling way! Like a couple of others in this series, we are presented with vignettes which weave back and forth between ancient mythological settings and more contemporary ones; giving us the opportunity to hear Angus tale from birth to finding his own true love while also being given a glimpse of how he is still relevant in the modern world...for Angus, it seems still bestows upon us his precious and wonderful dreams! We find that Angus touches the lives of someone in each little story, and each is compelling and beautiful in its own way. I was particularly amused to see Angus cast as a psychotherapist using lucid dreaming to help his patients...a nice little twist! I would definitely recommend this as a light, but amusing retelling of Angus, Celtic God of Dreams, I don't think you'll be disappointed! I'm certainly glad to have read this and I'm looking forward to seeing more in this series! ( )

http://www.vanbaar.net/renee/blog/?p=...

“This story is a retelling of the myth of Angus, a popular and attractive figure of the Celtic mythology of Ireland and Scotland. Angus is a giver of dreams, an Eros, a figure of youth” (Introduction).
Alexander McCall Smith is one of my favourite modern authors (I’m anxiously waiting for the release of the next Sunday Philosophy Club on October 5th!) and mythology is a subject I’m very much interested in, so a combination of the two was very promising. After ‘The Court of the Air’, I had to get used to the simple writing style in the stories (you could easily read this to kids). It alternates mythical stories about of Angus with stories in more recent times, with some parallels. For example, the myths say Angus was very close to his brother, and this is followed by a story about a Scottish boy in 1934 whose brother is sent to Canada to give him a better chance in life.
I read it in 2 days and was a bit disappointed with the size of it, but I did enjoy it. I’ll have to read it again to soak it up a bit more, but that is something I usually feel with Alexander McCall Smith’s works. I don’t think I’d advise people to buy it, but feel free to borrow it! ( )

Dream Angus is the fifth in Canongate’s Myths series, where leading contemporary authors take a variety of mythological stories, and retell them however they choose.
McAll Smith chooses the myth of Angus, a Celtic god of dream and love, of youth and beauty, a trickster with a benevolent heart, who brings love to others, but is fated himself to only ever love one woman, Caer, whom he has seen only in his own dreams.

McAll Smith takes a two-pronged approach, alternating between chapters retelling the basic story of Angus with five fables set in modern times, each in their own way touching on an aspect of Angus’ life and story. Angus may – or may not – be seen in these chapters, but his touch is in them all. The effect works well, and while it’s less ambitious than some of the books in this series so far, it’s a gently done reworking that is full of McAll Smith’s typical charm.

I have to confess I’d grown a little weary of his style, and have skipped his last few books, but this reminded me why I liked him in the first place. A good addition to the Canongate Myths, which remains a series well worth following. ( )

The retelling of the Celtic myths about Angus, the god of dreams and love. The myths are interwoven with contemporary stories about dreams and love.
A short and sweet book. ( )

McCall Smith is a fine writer with a wide and expanding repertoire of voices. I love how he moves in this book between a mythical history and contemporary realism. As usual, his overall tenor is upbeat and inspiring. A very nice book. ( )