Of Two Minds is a very deep book for kids. As an adult how it ends leads to quite an interesting train of thought I’m not sure young children will catch. This is my second time reading it. I remembered enjoying it thoroughly when I read it back in middle school. I can’t honestly say one way or another if I caught the concept revealed at the end of the book back then. I enjoyed it just as much this time around as an adult.
Lenora is a young teenage princess from a people who all have the power to create whatever they want. To imagine it is to make it be. She doesn’t understand why it’s law not to create worlds and change things to suit your will. Why were people afraid to change the color of their hair or imagine bright pink puppies?
After one incident too many her parents decide to marry her off to Prince Coren. They feel it will ground her, get her head out of her fantasies and make her a sensible woman. To that end they even plan to set a full brigade (4K-11K men) to think her solidly on the island she and Coren will make their future home, thus making escape impossible.
Angry, frightened, and confused Lenora escapes into somebody else’s world when making one of her own is impossible. Unfortunately, she also dragged the object of her distress with her. Coren, gangly redheaded and freckled, can’t even stand up without tripping over his feet. Could he be any more useless? It turns out he can – where’s his sense of adventure?
Rating: 4 Stars
Makes me want to check out the sequel More Minds
Spoilers:
Pg193
“I’m not dreaming?” Lenora said. “How do I know that for sure?”
“Well,” Lufa smiled, “I suppose none of us really knows that. Perhaps this is all a dream, a fantasy we will wake out of.”
…
“And if all her imaginings could be real, then who was to say that her reality wasn’t somebody else’s dream?”
…
Surely something this real couldn’t be just somebody’s imagination. Could it?
Ah, but couldn’t it? Especially in light of her adventure with Coren. Is her story her own or the very imaginings of others?
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