The Little Book of Dream Symbols: The Essential Guide to Over 700 of the Most Common Dreams

This is truly a little book in a handy 208 page, 5”x7” format. Towers is a psychic and tarotist, and on the board of the British Astrological and Psychic Society (BAPS). 

After a short introduction with an overview of the past 100 years of dream and sleep studies, the book gets right into the compilation of meanings. There's a huge body of dream lore out there, but the author's meanings are in some cases very different from those in other dream guides. There aren't any references or citations listed, and it doesn't appear that these are derivative meanings.

Entries are in alphabetical order. Each has a fairly brief description with potential meanings and outcomes. For example, in the entry for “Letter,” Towers writes: “If you receive good news, then the prediction is that you can look forward to good things coming, while the opposite applies if the news is bad. Routine or unimportant letters signify financial problems due to a poor budget.” The author has a number of entries that she calls “contrary dreams.” The entry for “Briefcase” is one of these: “This is a contrary dream because it is best if the briefcase is empty, as this means improvements in business. If it is full, you will be faced with losses.” The entry for “Ice” occupies an entire page, but most are about the length of the quotes given here. 

Since the author is British, North American readers might require a bit of searching to find the relevant entry. For example, “Package” is described as something being carried, whereas “Parcel” is something that's delivered. That said, most of the entries are straightforward and easy to find. There are 700 listings so an index would have been useful. The table of contents simply lists where alphabetical entries begin.

This is one of the most unusual dream guides I've seen, and having done a series of lectures on dream interpretation a few years back, I've seen a lot of them. Most tend to lean toward psychological interpretations that address the dreamer's state of mind and current situation. This book is aggressively predictive!

Since there are so many dream books out there and the contents of each draw on a different tradition or perspective (psychological, accumulated lore drawn from earlier references, etc), it's helpful to have a selection of dream books around to get several different opinions about the specific objects or activities that appear in a dream. If you're a person who remembers dreams and likes to figure out what they mean, this book is recommended as a unique view of the subject. 

~review by Elizabeth Hazel

Author: Jacqueline Towers
Hampton Roads Publishing, 2017
208 pages, $14.95 pb.