The Dreaming Tree

Imagine an adventure in Middle Earth as told from Galadrial’s point of view, and you’ll grasp the feeling conveyed in this story. In a world of human kingdoms and fading magic, Arafel is the last of the elves, her kin having hung their dreamstones and swords on a sacred tree and departed. Aravel maintains her fey enclave deep in the woods, somewhat reminiscent of The Last Unicorn, and wants nothing to do with the outer world until a human family with elvish blood in need of help draws her back into mortal affairs.The story spans about four generations of that family, who become the noble protectors of the forest and receive her aid in turn. The king meanwhile falls under the control of a dark power, and Arafel and her friends must ride into battle one last time.That’s the plot, but the most absorbing element is the depiction of what it means to be an elf, a being who occupies several different strata of reality at once, and who experiences the passage of time in a different way until she is drawn into mortal affairs, experiencing sorrow afresh as those mortals succumb to time and depart.And there are odd misadventures along the way. In one, a traveling minstrel takes one of the dreamstones from the Tree of Swords and Jewels and he and Arefel dream each other’s dreams.But the most striking element is the beauty and melancholy of being the last elf in a world on the brink of changing forever.Also, a song has been made that captures the mood. Check out Arafel's Lament on Youtube

One of my favourite stories, read and re-read for almost 30 years since it came out. The only reason I gave it 4 stars was the that the Kindle edition was not proofread before it was published - too many silly typos and misspellings. It looks as though the original manuscript was run through OCR software and nobody bothered to check the result for errors.

I read the first of the pair of stories decades ago. It was a joy to be able to read both back to back —- I wish there were more. CJ wrote masterfully here, as she did in the Morgaine series. One wishes the stories would go on forever.Thank you CJ.

I really liked this book and the characters including the pronunciation portion at the end. It took me a bit to move to a new book because I wasn't eager to leave "the world" it created. I found it to be well written and researched.

I read this book when I was nine years old.... Took me 26 years to remember the title and find it again!

I consider this Cherryh's masterwork.

After reading Fortress in the Eye of Time I was eager to savour this celtic effort by the same author.I found the same neat, accurate writing, the same fastidious attention to detail, the same unconventional characters.Mr/Ms Cherryh (I still have not found out which) shapes a fascinating twilight world were dimming elves, more inhuman than I have ever found them in a fantasy, are fading leaving their place to humans. There is no sense a fulfillment, nor predestination. Just sadness.It is not easy to create a novel out of these ideas. The author managed it in Fortress in the Eye of time, but this time unfortunately there is no plot. Nothing really happens in this book. Absolutely nothing. Characters do not come to life. You never connect with them. The atmosphere is fascinating but the final effect is boring.A disappointment.

I like many of C.J. Cheryl's books - I own more than 30 of them. This compendium was very readable, the first book more that the second (it is a pair). However, I'd put the Foreigner series way ahead of these.

The elven kingdom of Eald has shrunk to only a small portion of woodland that only a very special few can enter. Here the last remaining Sidhe lives and defends her people against the oncoming onslaught of Men and there weapons of iron. This is an omnibus of two books 'The Dreamstone' and 'Tree of Swords and Jewels'. The writing is as good as ever but I did find I would be jarred out of the story when I came across one of the welsh names I had no idea how to pronounce! This was occasionally annoying but overall the story was a good one and I did enjoy it!

This is a really good book, and I would recommend it to anyone who loves fantasy novels. The only down side is that it's not published in the UK so you do have to wait a bit longer for shipment from the US, but it's well worth the wait. I have nine chapters to go in the second book, which is a bit easier to read than the first one as there is more story to it. I would recommend that buyers persevere with this book as it does get better the further you get in to it.