The Dreamers by Karen Thompson Walker

The Dreamers

by Karen Thompson Walker

‘Riveting, profoundly moving’ Emily St. John Mandel, author of Station Eleven 
‘Beautiful and devastating’ Red
‘Thought-provoking and profound’ Cosmopolitan

Imagine a world where sleep could trap you, for days, for weeks, for months…

She sleeps through sunrise. She sleeps through sunset.
And yet, in those first few hours, the doctors can find nothing else wrong. She looks like an ordinary girl sleeping ordinary sleep.

Karen Thompson Walker's second novel tells the mesmerising story of a town transformed by a mystery illness that locks people in perpetual sleep and triggers extraordinary, life-altering dreams.

One night in an isolated college town in the hills of Southern California, a first-year student stumbles into her room and falls asleep. She sleeps through the morning, into the evening. Her roommate cannot rouse her. Neither can the paramedics, nor the perplexed doctors at the hospital.

When a second girl falls asleep, and then a third, panic takes hold of the college and spreads to the town. A young couple tries to protect their newborn baby as the once-quiet streets descend into chaos. Two sisters turn to each other for comfort as their survivalist father prepares for disaster.

Written in luminous prose, The Dreamers is a breathtaking and beautiful novel, startling and provocative, about the possibilities contained within a human life if only we are awakened to them.


Praise for The Age of Miracles:
'What a remarkable, beautifully wrought novel' Curtis Sittenfeld
‘A beautifully observed coming-of-age tale… nimble, delicate and emotionally sophisticated’ Observer
‘Hauntingly believable… an impressive and quietly terrifying book’ Sunday Times
'A stunner from the first page… I loved this novel and can't wait to see what this remarkable writer will do next' Justin Cronin
 

Reviewed by HekArtemis on

4 of 5 stars

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4.5 stars. Beautiful. It has a dreamlike quality, which I often don't enjoy but in this case it was so measured and calm that it didn't have that frantic feeling to it that similar writing styles often have.

I dropped half a star because of the prepper stereotype. Could've had a non-stereotyped pepper, and someone else as the paranoid crazy person. Seriously.

I didn't expect to love this book, honestly thought it would just be a typical contemporary urban meh story, full of drama and annoying tropes, but with a virus in it. Well it's nothing like that. It's unusual and beautiful. So glad I read this.

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Reading updates

  • Started reading
  • 4 July, 2020: Finished reading
  • 4 July, 2020: Reviewed