Slaves of Sleep and the Masters of Sleep

by L. Ron Hubbard

Overview

Condemned to "eternal wakefulness" and mistakenly arrested for murder, Jan Palmer finds himself transported to the exotically dangerous land of the Jinn.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780884046554
Publisher:	Bridge Publications, Inc.
Publication date:	10/28/1993
Series:	L. Ron Hubbard Fiction Classic Series
Pages:	316
Product dimensions:	6.51(w) x 9.60(h) x 1.31(d)

About the Author

L. Ron Hubbard (1911 - 1986), often referred to by his initials, LRH, was an American author and the founder of the Church of Scientology. Hubbard established his career as a writer with science fiction and fantasy novels, including the novel Battlefield Earth, which was adapted into a feature film in 2000. Starting in the 1950s, Hubbard created a system called Dianetics, which is a wide-ranging set of doctrines and practices that became the foundation of the religious movement Scientology.

Editorial Reviews

Hubbard (1911-1986) was one of the great pulp writers, and this brief SF novel, initially published in two parts in 1950 by John W. Campbell in Astounding Science Fiction, is one of his finest works. In it, Hubbard embraces one of SF's deepest goals, to explore the emotional consequences of technological advance, by imagining the effect upon star-faring humans of the "basic equation of mass and time.... AS MASS APPROACHES INFINITY, TIME APPROACHES ZERO." That is, as those who travel to distant stars at near light speed experience, say, the passing of a year, those left behind will experience the passing of decades, centuries. And so young nobleman Alan Corday responds in horror when, on Earth, he's kidnapped to the interstellar trader Hound of Heaven by order of its notorious Captain Jocelyn, who needs a new officer. Alan resists joining starship society, but when he returns home from several adventures in hopes of rejoining his fiancee, he finds her an ancient amnesiac and himself a man out of time, with no real home but that of the cursed starship. In heated prose ("The quivering Hound of Heaven hurled herself on course, blazing bow to bridge with particle flame..."), Hubbard brilliantly evokes the vastness of space and the tragedy of those who would conquer it. The novel's turning point-Alan's reckoning with time's implacability-is narrated suspensefully, but comes as no surprise; what does impress immensely is Hubbard's handling of the bitter consequences of Alan's realization, as well as his believable detailing of starship society. Readers used to today's bloated SF tomes will appreciate Hubbard's ability to pack an epic into relatively few pages-this is indeed golden SF from the Golden Age. (Sept.) Forecast: In an unusual move, legendary jazz master Chick Corea has created an identically titled soundtrack to the novel, also issued by Galaxy. With its enormous marketing muscle ready to tap into the vast Hubbard fan base and beyond, Galaxy should see both the book and the CD flirting with national lists. Copyright 2004 Reed Business Information.

Publishers Weekly

Hubbard's sf tale, first serialized in Astounding Science Fiction magazine in the 1950s, is here presented in a quality hardcover. Note that musician Chick Corea has released a CD of the same name, containing music inspired by the book. Copyright 2004 Reed Business Information.

Library Journal