Sleeper Awakes

by Robert Stikmanz

Faced with peril but aided by curious beings both puissant and comical, Boyd strives across landscapes at once mundane and remarkable to find true love, save his skin and become somehow less of a... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0981744397
• ISBN13: 9780981744391
• Release Date: January 2009
• Publisher: Dalton Publishing
• Length: 537 Pages
• Weight: 1.65 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.3" x 5.9" x 8.9"

Customer Reviews

a rare work of fantasy

Sleeper Awakes is a machine with a lot of moving parts: it's a love story, a paranoid thriller, and a deep meditation on the metaphysics of becoming. It borrows from science fiction, European folklore, and magical realism. It's at turns moving, angry, and very funny. There's so much going on here that a reader might fear she's in the hands of a writer whose reach exceeds his grasp. But Stikmanz pulls off a graceful genre-bending high-wire act. The machine may be complex, but it's well-constructed. In his world, it feels perfectly natural for Bigfoot to drop by and help you evade the cops, and in his novel, everything is there for a reason. If Sleeper Awakes could be said to have an agenda, it's a detailed philosophical investigation of the roles perception and intention play in the unfolding of Being, the heart of which may require a careful re-read or two. But this isn't a ponderous navel-gazing tome a la Pirsig or Huxley. On the contrary, he may well have written the first ontological page-turner. The story is tightly plotted, told in limpid prose, and driven by a large cast of fully realized characters. Jonathan Franzen once described the difference between genre fiction and literature as unpredictability. From its incongruous starting points to its surprising and satisfying conclusions, Sleeper Awakes is fulfilling the aims of literature, and I eagerly await my next visit to the Lands of Nod.

Fantastic Read

Stickmanz writing immerses you into his various worlds within worlds that are seperate and yet connected and dependant on each other. The detail Stickmanz goes into in developing language, culture, and ideology of the different people who inhabit his worlds is amazing and spellbinding. I was transported into a different realm where I lost myself in the worlds that Stickmanz created. Would that we all could have guardians such as Boyd does. I highly reccomend his books for the reader who is looking for something new and original or is just looking for a different escape from the ordinary and humdrum. I thoroughly enjoyed Sleeper Awakes and look forward to reading what happens next.

A Grand New Idea.

How can I even begin to review this book? Mr. Stikmanz has done something refreshingly orignial in Sleeper Awakes. He has both melded Science Fiction and Fantasy as well as making something very new. He has included utterly loveable companions for his hero (if you can really call him that!) and he has created villians that you just love to hate. In essence he has done everything any writer would want to do and he has thrown them all into a very interesting plot involving our own world in a way it has never been shown to us before to boot! If you are a fan of either Science Fiction or Fantasy from their golden days (before it all became so commercial with the next one so much like the last) you will love this book. If you love a good story at all you will love this book. And I recommend you read the two prequels (Prelude to a Change of Mind, Entranscing) aswell. I can't wait for the sequel!

Epic Fantasy

Here is epic fantasy in a modern setting ... make a great movie. This is Stikmanz's third Nod novel and it enriches his previous two books in the Hidden Lands series while setting up the next adventure. You don't need his three Nod's Way custom dice with divination system to read Sleeper Awakes but they will add extra dimensions not found in any other major work of fantasy. Great escapism --loaded with thought provoking concepts.

Expect the Unexpected!

Firstly, I would like to applaud R. Stikmanz for daring to venture outside the comfort zone of Sci-Fi/Fantasy. It is writers like these that keep the genre fresh and push it to explore many new and interesting directions. The first two books in the series (Prelude to a Change of Mind and Entrancing) are full of delightful narrative, blood chilling suspense, and many twists and turns. Sleeper awakes, the third book in The Hidden Lands of Nod series, is an outstanding piece of literary fiction that is far ahead of its time. The narrative flows with a beautiful rhythm and crystal clarity. The book does an excellent job of bringing the first two stories together and paving the way for what is yet to come. Sleeper Awakes pulls the reader through a suspenseful and imaginative story which leaves the reader begging for more. With its wonderful characters, scintillating plot line, suspenseful cliff hangars, and deep metaphor, Sleeper Awakes is a book for all ages and all types of readers. I highly recommend this book to anyone who enjoys an amazing journey through a beautiful work of Sci-Fi/Fantasy fiction.