Title: A Long, Long Sleep Series: UniCorp #1
Author: Anna Sheehan
Published: August 9, 2011
Genre(s): Science Fiction
Page Count: 342
Rating:
Summary from Goodreads:Rosalinda Fitzroy has been asleep for sixty-two years when she is woken by a kiss. Locked away in the chemically induced slumber of a stasis tube in a forgotten subbasement, sixteen-year-old Rose slept straight through the Dark Times that killed millions and utterly changed the world she knew. Now, her parents and her first love are long gone, and Rose—hailed upon her awakening as the long-lost heir to an interplanetary empire—is thrust alone into a future in which she is viewed as either a freak or a threat. Desperate to put the past behind her and adapt to her new world, Rose finds herself drawn to the boy who kissed her awake, hoping that he can help her to start fresh. But when a deadly danger jeopardizes her fragile new existence, Rose must face the ghosts of her past with open eyes—or be left without any future at all.
There are some books with ideas so unique and interesting that they make up for deficiencies in other areas. Anna Sheehan’s futuristic fairytale retelling is one such book. It took me over a month to read A Long, Long Sleep—not because it was bad, not really because of anything having to do with the book, honestly. But the only reason I finished, rather than setting this story aside to be forgotten in my ever-growing DNF pile, was because I was interested to see how things happened. If you’re still interested in a book after 4 weeks away from it, that probably says something.
Truthfully, A Long, Long Sleep has a lot of problems. The main character, Rose, has spent 60 years in cryo-sleep. She wakes up and struggles to adjust to her new surroundings, but doesn’t ask many questions about why she was forgotten in stasis for so long, what happened to her parents, etc. That didn’t ring true at all. Because of the way she grew up, the only constant Rose had in her life was her parents—to be so accepting of their mysterious absence fails as a plot point, though it does serve to draw out the suspense during the second act of the book.
And there are other problems, such as classic Disappearing (foster-)Parent Syndrome, which I found aggravating to no end. On the other hand, this slow-building story really does a great job presenting a unique situation, and really tackling relationships in a new way. Domestic abuse has never been written like this, though the story of Rose’s coming to learn that the way she grew up was abusive was nonetheless realistic and true. A Long, Long Sleep is very much a story about how Rose comes to love and value herself, and I think that’s really a great thing to write, especially in a retelling of a somewhat problematic, sexualized fairytale. Rose’s journey was what brought me back to this story, even after so long.
And no, I don’t particularly like Rose, and I thought her inactions (regarding the lack of curiosity) were frustrating at the very least. But her story was still important and interesting, set amid the backdrop of a future full of implanted alien DNA and space colonies and cryo-sleep. It’s really great that, if Sheehan took Rose out of her environment, she would still be relatable on many levels.
On the other hand, if you took Rose out of her environment, A Long, Long Sleep would cease to work as well as it does, because so much of the nuance of Rose’s journey is dependent on the world she lives in. I think that’s important, because it shows the author has written a story that’s nearly universal, but didn’t just plop it down into some space-age future setting because she could. This book needs to be written the way it was in order to work.
A Long, Long Sleep is not a perfect book—not even close. I probably have just as many issues with it as I do positive aspects. But I think Anna Sheehan has told a memorable story here, one that’s worth telling, one that’s worth reading. It deals with issues in ways I’ve never seen before, and approaches human suffering in a unique, yet respectful, manner, that really highlights the emotions and state of the protagonist. Overall, I’m pretty impressed with this book.
