Motherhood has been shown in literature in a romanticized way. However, the novel by Salman Alhamadi, Beautiful Dreams, avoids these stereotypes and presents a candid and unflattering view of the reality of the job. It is a powerful story that portrays motherhood not as a serene state, but as an unstoppable act of sacrifice and frantic struggle to survive; thus, it is a must-read for everyone who values complex and realistic characters
The Unseen Sacrifices of a Mother
Beautiful Dreams makes a brilliant attempt to demonstrate that the most significant maternal sacrifices are those that a person can barely see. In the case of the protagonist Anna, the main thing that is sacrificed is her mental and emotional health. In her desperate attempt to save her son, Victor, against an evil menace that she is the only one witnessing, she loses her peace of mind, credibility, and association with a collective reality.
The more and more desperate deeds of her nature, which are founded on the case of pure love, are considered by others as madness. This creates a severe social loss: her alienation. Anna has gone through the world alone, and that is a bitter reality. The protective instinct a mother has may put her in conflict with the whole world, and she may need to lose her position to protect her child.
The Animal Survival Instinct
Simply put, the story of Anna is one of survival. All her sacrifices are driven by an animal instinct that is non-negotiable and demands that her child live. The villain, Dmitri, poses not only a danger to Victor’s innocence but also to his life, and Anna’s struggle against him is an explicit account of a mother determined to keep her children safe from a predator
At the same time, the survival of Anna is the subject of the novel. It is a struggle between her spirit and her sanity with the powers of gaslighting and manipulation. The fact that she struggles to hold onto the truth even at the expense of everything is an act of self-preservation of immense proportions. The author makes a compelling case in Beautiful Dreams, arguing that motherhood is a two-front war where a woman must fight to save both her child and herself.
To sum up, Beautiful Dreams is an indispensable novel on the subject of motherhood. It faces the bleak facts of the job with sincerity and sympathy and builds a striking portrait of a mother who can be characterized by what she willingly sacrifices as well as by her indomitable determination to survive.