<p>Professor Vellitt Boe teaches at the prestigious Ulthar Women’s College. When one of her most gifted students elopes with a dreamer from the waking world, Vellitt must retrieve her. </p><p>But the journey sends her on a quest across the Dreamlands and into her own mysterious past, where some secrets were never meant to surface.</p><br><p>"Kij Johnson has an unrivalled gift for making the unreal real and the real unreal. In this spellbinding story, the intense reality of a quest through dreamland finds its goal in a here-and-now America that seems even stranger than the mountains and caverns of the dream. " —Ursula K. Le Guin</p><p>"With 'The Dream-quest of Vellitt Boe,' Kij Johnson has deftly spun a delight and a wonder. Truly, this is one of my favorite weird tales of the last several years, weaving beauty, terror, and bittersweet triumph from a corner of Lovecraft's mythos that all too few dreamers dare to explore. Brava!" —Caitlin R. Kiernan</p><p>"Kij Johnson's haunting novella "The Dream-quest of Vellitt Boe" is both a commentary on a classic H.P. Lovecraft tale and a profound reflection on a woman's life. Vellitt's quest to find a former student who may be the only person who can save her community takes her through a world governed by a seemingly arbitrary dream logic in which she occasionally glimpses an underlying but mysterious order, a world ruled by capricious gods and populated by the creatures of dreams and nightmares. Those familiar with Lovecraft's work will travel through a fantasy landscape infused with Lovecraftian images viewed from another perspective, but even readers unfamiliar with his work will be enthralled by Vellitt's quest. A remarkable accomplishment that repays rereading." -- <i>Pamela Sargent, winner of the Nebula Award</i></p>