One of the very first books I recommended here was Age of Miracles by Karen Thompson Walker, over 6 years ago. I loved how it followed a pre-teen girl through normal pre-teen struggles while also dealing with this huge thing happening in the world, where the days were slowly getting longer. We all say we want more hours in the day but that book makes it very obvious that we DO NOT.
Sometime last year I heard she had a new book coming out, only her second, and I immediately added it to my TBR. It didn't really matter what it was about, I was going to read it. That was this book, The Dreamers by Karen Thompson Walker. I had heard it getting a decent amount of hype before I finally got my library copy and read it but I wasn't sure if I'd like it because WHO KNOWS!?!? The more you are looking forward to something the more likely it can and will let you know. High expectations have a lot of room to fall.
Here's the story: in a college town in California, one girl falls asleep in her dorm room and doesn't wake up. She's the first case. Then it happens to more girls on the floor and slowly to more and more people. These people seem to be healthy, besides being asleep and unable to wake up. But if you are just asleep you still need nutrients and water, you can't just sleep this off somewhere because you will die of dehydration.
The story follows multiple people - the roommate of the first girl, new parents who teach at the college and have a newborn baby, their next door neighbors: a widowed Dad who is a janitor (I think?) at the college and his tween daughters, other cases of people who have fallen asleep. Even with all the different people to follow, I didn't find it difficult to keep track of who was who and where they were in the story.
The story takes place over just a couple of weeks and it was fascinating how quickly life changed for everyone in this town. Nobody knew what caused this disease and how it was spreading. People grew terrified to fall asleep, not knowing if they would wake up. And what were all these people dreaming about anyways?
It was blurbed by Emily St. John Mandel who wrote Station Eleven (one of my favorite reads of 2017) and I would say it's a read alike to that book as well as Age of Miracles. Different situations but all covering a story that is impacting a large number of people and told from multiple perspectives. None have a horror or thriller bend but all very interested in following the humanity of the people who are dealing with these big things.
I really enjoyed this one and kept finding time to pick it up so I could get to the end, see what answers we'd get for what happened to these people and if they would wake up. I had high expectations and it pretty much lived up to them, rare! It's just February but this is probably the best book I've read this year and has a good chance of ending up on my best of 2019 list.
If you read and enjoyed Station Eleven I'd recommend this. If you like beautiful (but accessible) writing about people going through something hard and bigger than them, I'd recommend. It sure made me appreciate my ability to wake up.
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