There has long been talk about a real Venice and a fake Venice.  Now there's the added complication of this newish expression, "the other Venice".   But, and may it be small comfort, what I know for certain about all of that is this:  There are a lot more than two or three "Venices" and there is no other Venice.  We only get one!  How we experience it...that's another question.

Sooner or later everyone comes to Venice.  If they're lucky, they discover the Venice that speaks to them be it the Venice of art, the Venice of churches, the Venice of bacari, the Venice of confounding luxury, the Venice of beaches.  Or, yes, even the Venice of tremendously long Vaporetto lines and absurdly expensive bruschetta.  It is all as real  to them as the decidedly surreal world of Venice can be.

Meanwhile, dispersed amid the tiny places to the wide open spaces of Venice, to the sands of Lido and the rolling farms of Sant'Erasmo, in the bus-on-the-boat from Pelestrina and hanging laundry above a tiny campo in Santa Croce there are Venetians.  Far from being all the same, they are also each living in their own Venice.

So let's ignore all of the real, fake and other Venices for the moment.  Let me just ask you:  What's your Venice?

It feels like a dream, but it isn't one.  JoAnn Locktov & Charles Christopher have created a book that captures the siren song of the living Venice - heard in fleeting moments by only a fortunate few - and conveys it beautifully to anyone lucky enough to flip through the pages of Dream of Venice.

For those already in love with Venice, Dream of Venice is a compelling tribute to the city which captures not only it's beauty but also the illusive dream of Venice as a city belonging to itself.  We can step inside of Charles Christopher's gorgeous photographs are relive those precious moments - so often cherished yet so rarely captured - when, walking home on a damp night in Venice, in the most unlikely of places the heartbeat of Venice makes itself heard.  In the prose and commentary selected by JoAnn Locktov we can hear the voices of those whom, like ourselves, recognize the precious inner life of Venice even as they realize that this is Venice' most closely guarded secret.  It will take a lifetime to become truly close to Venice.  

Yes, that is contemporary Venice.  And, Dream of Venice conveys that lovely and fragile reality in a way I have never seen done before.  As a Venice-lover, I admire and am moved by this work so full of views and sentiments that are at once familiar and elusive to me.  Dream of Venice is a book certain to be cherished by Venetians and Venetophiles alike.

Still, perhaps those who have not yet been to Venice are the truly lucky ones...  

To experience the richly textured, watery world of Venice as captured by Charles Christopher and step into the universe of "too much beauty" described by Eleonora Baldwin, before buying your first vaporetto ticket?  To arrive in Venice prepared to meet Alessandro Falassi's "city born from the waters like Aphrodite, constantly on the verge of plunging back into the sea, living in its own precarious balance"?  Yes, send to Dream of Venice to anyone planning a visit to Venice.  You will have opened their eyes to a Venetian dream and enriched their experience of Venice before it even happened.

Yet, notably, one needn't have any relationship with Venice at all to enjoy Dream of Venice.  The book stands sturdily on its own as an engrossing work of art - a stunning collection of photographs and prose - quite capable of transporting even a casual viewer.  Charles Chistopher's photographs depict a multi-dimensional world into which anyone could step and take a breath of moist air, explore narrow streets, chase sunbeams across canals and brush salt crystals from the stone outer walls of Venice.  And who wouldn't want to lose himself in this place where, as described by Frances Mayes, "Nowhere is the moon so powerful, enormous, so…heavenly"?   People are going to dream.  Let them dream of Venice!  

Dream of Venice is also available in these bookstores:

Who knows where I was?