INSIPID: "Wanting in the qualities which affect the organs of taste; without taste or savor; vapid; tasteless."
That just about sums it up.
Perhaps something was lost in the translation from Korean to English, but this book felt synthetic ... as if it were computer-generated. (That certainly applies to the above book cover, too.) Nothing comes alive - not the characters, not the plot, not the setting. It all comes off as flat, fake, simulated.
The main theme, a store that sells dreams, is weak and convoluted. The "dream marketplace" seems to have insinuated itself into a space where it was never needed to begin with - a middleman who sells your own imagination back to you.
There is no sense of conflict or real tension in the story, since it's all about affirming the "ordered" state of dreamland. There is no chaos or disorder or depth or ambiguity. The "authority figure" characters are all-seeing and benevolent, which gets creepy in a way the author may not have intended.
Santa Claus appears as a character. It doesn't help.
Is this aimed at children? Then children deserve better literature.
Avoid.
