It’s not very often that you come across a book that frightens you, not particularly for the storyline, but for the possibility that this is an entirely foreseeable future for people on this planet. The Dream Hotel doesn’t quite get to the point of a full-on dystopian thriller, but author Laila Lalami cleverly takes us right to the brink, which is where the true horror lies.
The book centres round Sara, who on her return from a business conference is whisked away by the Risk Assessment Unit. This unit is set up to monitor people’s thoughts and dreams and, on that basis, determine if they’re dangerous to the public. Deemed a high risk, Sara is sent to a detention centre for 21 days to be monitored: if she can lower her risk score, she can be released.
With her every movement, thought and dream under observation, it soon becomes apparent that Sara stands little chance of leaving the detention centre, as the ‘punishments’ for her thoughts mount up. It’ll take rebellion to shake things up, and when a new resident enters the fray, Sara is able to pull the curtain inside and confront the companies that deny her, her freedom.
In the current political and technological climate and the seemingly endless colonisation of data, Lalami has manged to tap into the human psyche on a level that everybody can relate to. The Dream Hotel can deservedly and comfortably sit somewhere between Phillip K Dick’s Minority Report and Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale. A powerhouse of a book that will live long in the memory.
