Dream Sequences

[metajinx]

I use dream sequences, but sparingly. I don't like them if they are long or too realistic (3 pages of step by step action), and I definitely don't like dreams that act like visions or warnings or anything else railroading the action and "spoilering" me. Dreams are a wonderful tool to show a state of mind (diffuse nightmares, anyone?), or to shape the voice of a story, oooor to show how a character is different form the rest of the world (a specific dream that repeats itself, for example), but in my opinion dreams on their own are already disconnected from reality for us and i think they shouldn't be made into something more than that.