The Dream Millennium

by James White

Book Overview

Del Rey / Ballantine, 1982. Paperback, 2nd printing. This 1974 science fiction novel revolves around the captain of a starship who, along with the rest of the people on board, is fleeing a dystopian... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Mass Market Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 034524012X
• ISBN13: 9780345240125
• Release Date: June 1974
• Publisher: Ballantine Books
• Length: 217 Pages
• Weight: 0.30 lbs.

Customer Reviews

Starship Travellers Haunted By Primeval Dreams

If you like your science fiction to be full of warships and warriors, then James White isn't really for you. His characters are normally peace-lovers, and frequently physicians or healers. In fact, his short story "Tableau" must be one of the greatest anti-war stories in SF.So it's ironic that he lived in Northern Ireland, epicentre of urban violence and terrorism. It's clear that the Troubles had a major influence on the writing of "The Dream Millenium".White's main character Devlin is a doctor living some decades from now , in a world of artistic and scientific advance, but also overpopulation, increasing pollution and barely controlled urban disorder. So, for example, when making a house call he keeps the steel shutters closed over his car windows and steers using a periscope. His position as a doctor means he can avoid wearing the gunbelt that signifies willingness to take part in duelling.Devlin's life brightens up when he meets the beautiful, thoughtful but troubled Patricia Morley. Soon after this the couple are astounded to be offered places - as the crew - on a top-secret interstellar craft.This is not a particularly glamorous interstellar voyage. The ship travels much slower than light, and everyone on board will lie frozen asleep, perhaps being awakened every century or so. The crew and passengers were deliberately picked to be ordinary, average people. The mission is simply to find a habitable planet to colonise , because civilisation on Earth is probably doomed. The trip is one-way.After one or two routine awakenings, Devlin and Morley realise there is an unexpected hazard of the voyage. Everyone is experiencing lengthy, frighteningly realistic dreams of the past - of being a trilobite for example, or a dinosaur, or a medieval king. Some of these dreams have so much suffering and pain that suicide seems preferable to going back to sleep. Devlin and Morley have to find reasons and solutions, and save the mission.I've enjoyed reading this book several times. The plot grips you and the starship feels especially realistic. White sympathetically depicts a wide range of characters , from a primitive beast scuttling along the seafloor to a former terrorist who now only wants to be a schoolteacher. Although the content of the book is fairly downbeat, the actual tone is positive and carries a message of hope.

Starship sleepers

Recommended reading. James White's "Dream Millennium" was first serialized in "Galaxy" in 1973 and reworked for a book edition in 1974. It has not dated at all in the nearly 25 years since its first publication. The situation is an Earth that is technologically advanced but disintegrating socially. The absence of gun control and a custom of forceful civilian retaliation against violent crime has engendered a society divided into unarmed, peaceful "sheep" and gun-toting vigilantes who seek any excuse for an "affair" -- a duel or gunfight. A kind of feudal code of honor and etiquette has arisen reminiscent of that in Robert Heinlein's "Beyond This Horizon," but contrary to Heinlein's optimism, White foresees the prevalence of guns as only abetting violence. The consequence is urban life blighted by what amounts to ceaseless gang warfare with high-powered weapons. A group of visionaries represented by a religious figure, Brother Howard, and a psychiatrist, Dr. Martin, prepare a "cold-sleep" starship with 200 colonists and a "crew" of two: a doctor, John Devlin, and his love interest, Patricia Morley. Their 1000-year mission is to fly a 250 light-year course to as many as ten star systems in search of an inhabitable planet. The problem is that "cold sleep" enhances vivid dreams in the hibernating passengers. The dreams are so realistic and terrifying that one colonist is driven to suicide in one of the periodic awakenings. Devlin fears for his and everyone's sanity. Nor is that the crew's only worry: in the fifth system, hostile aliens launch nuclear missiles from a hopelessly polluted world eerily reminiscent of Earth. The resolution involves a fascinating mystical interpretation of the cold-sleep dreams and a final encounter with alien colonists from the fifth system. White's style is definitely that of the 1970's. Its economy is reminiscent of Joe Haldeman's and is a welcome relief from the baroque contrivances found in many novels of the '90s.