Tratara

Tratara
 

A book I am reading contains

como si se tratara en un sueño

Should it be tratará
Could they mean future tense.
Doesn’t seem to fit

Why not just trata

It's the subjunctive of tratar, and it sounds correct to me. Even in English como si (as if) is followed by the subjunctive (as if it were).

I concur with poli: the sentence means "as if it were in a dream". "se tratara/tratase" is the imperfect subjunctive of "tratar". The expression "como si" often introduces a clause whose main verb is in the imperfect subjunctive, particularly when the clause following "como si" is not actually true.

Thank you

My mistake