“Gray Matter: Sleep and Dreaming”; By Marvin Rosen: A Review

Gray Matter is a series of 10 books about the brain put out by Chelsea House Publishers. This is the only book in the series devoted to sleep and dreams, written by youth clinical psychologist Marvin Rosen. Although the Gray Matter series is aimed for readers in their early teens, the concise explanations and large print will be appreciated by adults. I found the series in my local library in the adult non-fiction section. Your library may file it in the children's section.

This is a very attractive book with plenty of illustrations and photographs. It has a decent bibliography (including several titles familiar to those of us that enjoy learning about dreams) and a fine index. It's a shame that such a well organized book is so short - about 150 pages, including bibliography.

The Good, the Bad and the Annoying

Sleep and Dreaming (2006) focuses on the science of sleep and how dreams are used in therapy much more than on dreams themselves. Anyone looking for a book solely on dreams will be disappointed. Lucid dreaming is mentioned very briefly. Anyone who has read even one Stephen La Berge or Robert Moss book will find much of Sleep and Dreaming old hat.

But if you never read any books by those guys, than Sleep and Dreaming is a good read. Some of the sections only seem tentatively related to sleep and dreams (did we really need three pages on behaviorism in a mere 150 page book?) but attempts to chronicle the history of brain studies as an over-explanation of why there has not been much research on dreams or on sleep.

Another annoying bit was that each chapter ended with a list of keywords and key phrases to enter into your favorite online search engine. I know that the "find more information online" mantra has become de rigueur in journalism, but do we really need it in books, too? Isn't this why I'm reading a book - to find this crap out? If I wanted to find information online, I'd go online, thank you.

In Conclusion

Sleep and Dreaming is good for:

• Anyone curious about sleep and dreams and just does not know what to read first
• Anyone who has never read Stephen La Berge or Robert Moss
• Anyone who read books about dreams years ago and needs a quick synopsis
• Anyone under the age of 16