Recently, I was talking with my father about books.

He told me he had started reading The Crimson Legacy with my niece. However, after a few chapters, he realized the language and themes were more advanced than he had initially expected. He decided he would finish it with her when she was a little older.

Naturally, I asked him a question.

"Why don't you just read it yourself?"

His answer didn't surprise me.

My father has always preferred books rooted firmly in reality. If it isn't supported by facts, history, science, or practical knowledge, it simply isn't something that interests him.

And there is absolutely nothing wrong with that.

The funny thing is that I have always been the exact opposite.

Ever since I was very young, books became my doorway to places beyond the world immediately around me.

I read everything I could get my hands on.

Fiction.

Non-fiction.

Encyclopedias.

Manuals.

Reference books.

Whatever happened to be available.

In fact, by the age of twelve, I could take apart and reassemble a carburetor.

Not because I planned to become a mechanic.

It was simply the only book left in the house that I hadn't already read.

So I read it.

One Christmas, I received a book called The Story Girl.

I still have that book today, although the front cover disappeared many years ago.

What remains is the story itself.

It transported me somewhere else.

To another place.

Another time.

Another life.

And that was the beginning.

As I grew older, my shelves filled with names that would remain with me for decades.

Edgar Allan Poe.

C.S. Lewis.

Charles Dickens.

Stephen King.

And so many others.

When I felt alone, lost, or uncertain of where I belonged, their stories became companions.

Poe's Ligeia remains oddly comforting to me even now.

The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe carried me to Narnia, a place I would have happily remained forever.

Yet even those fantastical worlds were never truly about escaping reality.

They were about understanding it.

C.S. Lewis wrote about wonder and imagination, but he also wrote A Grief Observed, one of the most honest explorations of loss I have ever encountered.

Stephen King filled pages with monsters and nightmares, yet so many of his stories are ultimately about fear, resilience, and what it means to be human.

As I grew older, I discovered yet another storyteller whose work would leave a lasting impression on me.

Neil Gaiman's The Sandman series was unlike anything I had encountered before.

It wasn't simply fantasy.

It wasn't simply horror.

It wasn't even entirely about dreams.

It was about what dreams reveal.

Sometimes we can become lost within a world of dreams.

Some are frightening.

Some hold us captive.

Some challenge everything we believe about ourselves.

And others reveal truths we never knew existed.

The Dreaming in The Sandman is not merely a place people visit while sleeping. It is a reflection of imagination, memory, desire, fear, and possibility. A place where the boundaries between reality and fantasy blur until it becomes difficult to tell where one ends and the other begins.

Perhaps that is why the series resonated so deeply with me.

Because dreams are rarely just dreams.

They are mirrors.

They show us our hopes.

Our regrets.

Our fears.

And sometimes the parts of ourselves we have not yet discovered.

Long before I ever began writing The Dream Realm, I was fascinated by that idea.

The possibility that a dream could be more than an illusion.

That it could become a place of transformation.

A place where a person enters as one version of themselves and leaves as another.

As the years passed, my love of books only grew stronger.

More recently, I have found myself captivated by stories such as Alchemised by SenLinYu and The Witches of Scotland series by Steven P Aitchison. 

Different worlds.

Different characters.

Different struggles.

Yet each one pulled me into a place that felt real despite being entirely imagined.

And that is where I often find myself disagreeing with those who dismiss fantasy as simple escapism.

Perhaps it is escapism.

But perhaps that isn't a weakness.

Perhaps that is how many of us survive.

Sometimes life becomes heavy.

Sometimes reality asks more of us than we believe we can give.

Sometimes grief, illness, disappointment, or loneliness settle around us like a storm cloud.

In those moments, stories offer something invaluable.

Not an escape from life.

A chance to breathe.

A chance to regroup.

A chance to remember that there is still wonder, courage, hope, and possibility in the world.

Every book I have ever read has left something behind.

Some taught me facts.

Some taught me skills.

Some taught me empathy.

Some taught me courage.

And some simply reminded me that I was not alone.

If building a world filled with pirates, monsters, sirens, mermaids, ancient magic, and impossible adventures became my way of navigating life's challenges, then I am grateful for it.

Writing gave me purpose.

It gave me confidence.

It helped me find my voice.

It helped me face limitations I never expected to encounter.

It helped me endure difficult chapters in my own life.

Most importantly, it helped me connect with people I may never have met otherwise.

Some may find that silly.

Some may dismiss it entirely.

That is their choice.

But I am proud of what I created.

What began as a game, a few friendships, and a collection of ideas became something far greater than I ever imagined.

A world.

A series.

A legacy.

And perhaps my own quiet way of proving that I was capable of more than others expected.

So what is the difference between escaping reality and surviving it?

Perhaps the answer is simpler than we think.

Escaping reality means refusing to face it.

Surviving reality means finding the strength to face it another day.

For many of us, stories help provide that strength.

They remind us that others have walked through darkness before us.

They show us courage when we feel afraid.

They offer hope when hope feels distant.

And sometimes, they help us discover pieces of ourselves we never knew existed.

Perhaps that is why I continue to read.

Why I continue to write.

And why I continue to dream.

Because sometimes turning a page is exactly what we need to keep moving forward.

Until next time Lovelies,

Always,

Ambrose Fider