PRISON OF SLEEP - Tim Pratt


 Zaxony (Zax) Delatree lives an unusual life.  Every time he falls asleep he wakes up in a new world. Every waking day a new adventure - sometimes pleasant, sometimes life-threatening. It had been a lonely existence until he had met Ana - a companion who was one of The Sleepers - a group of travelers also existing between the worlds. But Ana had gotten irretrievably left behind on a world long ago and Zax now has Minna, a new companion who has found a way to travel the worlds with Zax.

The good news for the duo is that they are no longer being pursued through the worlds by Lector, a psychotic man who wanted full control of the ability to world hop. The bad news is that there is a cult of travelers who know the method of world-hopping (a parasite in the bloodstream that lives between dimensions and releases a toxin that provides the strange travelling). The cult are servants to The Prisoner - a being trapped between dimensions - and they believe that they only way to free their leader is to collapse all the different worlds - meaning the complete destruction of thousands of worlds and trillions and trillions of lives.

Ana has found a way to catch up to Zax and now Zax, Ana, and Minna are on a new journey to save all the worlds.

I really love the concept of the series (duology?).  As I believe I mentioned in my review of the first book, I think this is one of the most creative concepts I've come across in a long time. And of course there's a tremendous challenge for Pratt - not only is he creating a world in which Zax and friends travel by way of sleeping, he's creating multiple worlds inside this world.  How fun is that?!

This book didn't have quite the excitement level as the previous book.  In part, because it wasn't so new to us anymore (not much you can do about that), but rather than being chased, Zax becomes the chaser. Sort of.  (Yeah, I know, it's a little confusing to try and sum up something rather complicated.)

There's a large focus on Ana and her story - what happened to her and how she works to reconnect with Zax (every other chapter is hers). This seems really important (and it is), but when they do finally reconnect, what feels like it should be pretty momentous, kind of fizzles for me. Although I respect that this re-encounter also feels pretty authentic.

For me, Tim Pratt is a name that I will continue to read and there aren't a lot of authors whose books I will be guaranteed to read.

Looking for a good book? Prison of Sleep by Tim Pratt is the second book in the Journals of Zaxony Delatree series and is an incredibly original scifi concept, well worth reading.

I received a digital copy of this book from the publisher, through Netgalley, in exchange for an honest review.

4 stars

* * * * * *

Prison of Sleep

author: Tim Pratt

series: Journals of Zaxony Delatree #2

publisher: Angry Robot

ISBN: 9780857669421

paperback, 288 pages

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

MURDLE VOLUME 1 - G. T. Karber

Image
 I enjoy puzzles of many different varieties. I had not heard of 'Murdle' before this but essentially this is a combination of the game of Clue and a Sherlock Holmes micro story. With suspects, possible murder weapons, potential locations, and/or motives plus some very brief hints, readers are meant to combine the logic of what's know with deductive reasoning to identify the killer (or killers?) in 100 different mystery word puzzles. I will admit right off the bat that I did not do all 100.  I didn't even do half of these, but I did so some random sampling through all the categories (Elementary, Occult Medium, Hard Boiled, and Impossible). I did not get any correct in the Impossible category (of course not ... they were impossible!) and only one correct in the Hard Boiled (of five). The Elementary puzzles were, as expected, pretty easy and the Hard Boiled only a little bit more difficult. Each mini mystery comes with a grid printed in the book to help the reader-detecti
Read more

VINYL RESTING PLACE - Olivia Blacke

Image
 Juni Jessup and her two sister, Tansy and Maggie, have gone into business together in their hometown of Cedar River, Texas, opening a combination record store and coffee shop. Vinyl LPs are making a comeback after all, despite critics thinking the medium was dead.  But speaking of 'dead' ... finding a dead body in the supply closet just as they are looking to have a grand opening is not part of the plan.  Juni's life gets more complicated when their uncle, Calvin, already a suspect in the murder, disappears. And the police officer leading the investigation is Juni's EX-boyfriend (who passive-aggressively keeps putting himself back into her life). Convinced that her uncle would never murder anyone, Juni sets out to prove his innocence - which isn't easy since he's making himself look guilty - because Calvin is family and family is EVERYthing to Juni. As readers of my blog know, I'm not a big fan of most cozy mysteries, but the setting caught my eye and my in
Read more

THE RAVEN THIEF - Gigi Pandian

Image
 With Tempest Raj now a member of the company, Secret Staircase Construction (a company who, as their title suggests, builds mystery-themed, secret rooms inside homes) has finished their first job. Their client now wants to celebrate to kick off her new beginning - new home and new life now that she's divorced from her cheating ex-husband, famous mystery author Corbin Colt. First up, a mock séance to remove any trace of Corbin from the property, led by Tempest's friend, Sanjay.   But during that séance, while all those gathered sat in a dark room holding hands, Corbin's dead body crashes the party, falling across the table in front of everyone. There were eight people in the room, and they were all holding hands, but all the evidence points to one of them being the murderer.  Suspicions point to Ash, Tempest's grandfather, because he was the only one with Corbin's blood on him. Of course, as a doctor, he was also the only one who checked on the body - wherein he acq
Read more