by Karen Thompson Walker

I've been caught out once again by a book written in present tense. Why, oh why is this a thing?

The story is about a strange virus that makes people fall asleep and not wake up, but remain dreaming. It was an interesting premise, but because present tense is so difficult to read I couldn't really get into the story.

Some interesting ideas in there, but it's just not for me.

The story of a "sleeping sickness" virus that sweeps through a small, isolated college town. It was recommended in an NPR article on epidemic/plague fiction as reflective of our current situation: 

In parallel with today's pandemic, the characters in Walker's novel confront a shortage of face masks. There is a panicked run on supermarkets. Waves through a window to loved ones under quarantine. Talk of it all being a hoax. And, just as now, the impossibility of knowing what's to come.

And truthfully, that's the most interesting part of this book. It started well, with interesting enough characters and storylines to lift it past my annoyance with the present-tense stylings and Cassandra Campbell's breathily droning narration, but really lost momentum in the second half. At that point, I couldn't ignore the sheer ridiculousness of the scientific/medical basis of this disease, diagnosis, and treatment anymore, and the last few chapters devolved into some navel-gazing about the nature of life and dreams and relationships that just didn't work for me. I was a little relieved when I got to The End.

But the first half was good enough for an overall 3 star rating. 

Audiobook, borrowed from my public library via Overdrive. 

On the one hand, this book is taking forever for anything to actually happen. On the other, it's still oddly interesting as we get to know the characters and figure out what is going on in the wider world through each one's experiences.

Even Cassandra Campbell's droning voice doesn't spoil it. How does she get so many audio jobs?

I came across this article on NPR today and decided to give this book and the Geraldine Brooks one a try. Since this one was in my library, I went ahead and borrowed it. I might just hate it on audio, though, because Cassandra Campbell is narrating it and she annoys me mightily.

Sorry, Peter Cline, you've been pushed back!

The Dreamers by Karen Thompson Walker is a dystopian sci-fi novel that takes place in a small town in California. (Is it still dystopian/apocalyptic if it's contained in one area?) The book begins with a young girl in college who is a bit of a misfit on her dorm floor. She doesn't even have much of a relationship with her roommate...and then that roommate doesn't wake up the next morning. This is the start of a sleeping sickness that spreads throughout the city radiating out from the college campus. Written with multiple narrative lines and only a few likable characters this probably isn't the one for you if you're looking for a more straightforward contemporary fiction. This book explores what happens when a biological contagion that is not fully understood (and clearly not prepared for) rapidly spreads and the ensuing chaos. I'm talking about governmental influence, hazmat suits, and lock-down quarantine with all the requisite fear and panic, ya'll. This is disaster relief (contemporary fiction style) meets sci-fi (those afflicted are experiencing REM i.e. dreaming...and it might be precognition). This was a fast paced book (I zipped right through it) which I enjoyed for the most part but I was left feeling like there were a lot of loose ends that the author didn't adequately tie off. So this was ultimately a middle of the road read for me. 5/10

What I'm Currently Reading: A Discovery of Witches by Deborah Harkness