Imagine being able to fly like Superman or have all the sex you desire with anyone you want. According to the authors Dylan Tuccillo, Jared Zeizel and Thomas Peisel, these things and anything else you can think of are completely attainable if you master the art of lucid dreaming.

Lucid dreaming occurs when your subconscious is aware that you are dreaming, allowing you to “awake” in your dream and therefore manipulate it. The first third or so of A Field Guide to Lucid Dreaming lays out three techniques for potential lucid dreamers to practice, one of which is to set an intention, such as “I am aware and lucid in my dream,” as you prepare for sleep.

Another is to perform “reality checks” throughout the waking day --- look around and ask yourself if you’re dreaming. This may seem silly at first, but the idea is to program your mind so as you’ll ask yourself the same question while you’re dreaming.

The third is learning to recognize dream signs or triggers, things that often recur in your dreams that are indicators that you are dreaming; one man quoted in the book says that he often realizes he’s dreaming when he flips a light switch and the lights don’t come on.

Tips on how to remember dreams: keep a dream journal and maintain healthy sleep habits. All things that’ll help the lucid dreamer along are also covered in the early portion of the book.

The remainder of the book is where it really starts getting fun. Here, you’ll learn how to shape your dream world and how to traverse it, how to meet up with old friends or celebrities and, humorously, how to treat the “natives.” "Natives" is the term the authors give to the people you meet in your dreams and surprisingly enough, even though they’re not real, they do have feelings. It’s widely believed that these people are extrapolations of bits of your own personality, so you shouldn’t ignore them or be rude to them. The authors suggest that asking common questions such as “What is your name?” or “Where are we?” is a good idea that’ll ultimately enhance your ability to craft a lucid dream to your liking.

Maybe a bit too far out for many, but lucid dream shape-shifting is also discussed in case you’d like to lumber through the woods as a bear or take a sea cruise as a dolphin.

Written in a conversational style but without a lot of fluff, A Field Guide to Lucid Dreaming will be extremely helpful to anyone who wants to explore their subconscious in this manner; curl up with it tonight and who knows where you’ll have been by tomorrow?

Grade: A