Dream Sequence
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3.5 • 2 Ratings
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- $18.99
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- $18.99
Publisher Description
NOMINATED FOR THE 2019 SCOTIABANK GILLER PRIZE
A CBC DAY 6 MUST-READ BOOK FOR SUMMER
A 49TH SHELF EDITOR'S PICK
Henry Banks, star of the UK’s most popular television series, has higher aspirations, ones befitting of his talent: a serious film career, beginning with a role in a brilliant Spanish director’s next movie. To make the jump to the big screen, he’ll have to remake himself in more than one way. But as he runs his morning miles and scrutinizes his changing physique in the mirror, he doesn’t know that he’s not alone in his obsession—Kristin, an unstable American fan, has her own ambitions. From the author of Man-Booker shortlisted The Quickening Maze, Dream Sequence is a moving depiction of desire and delusion and the unsettling consequences of fame.
APPLE BOOKS REVIEW
The fame game is full of traps, and Adam Foulds’ novel gives us a delightful look at its dangers and delusions. Henry Banks is a self-absorbed TV actor who’s determined to earn big-screen immortality by essentially stalking a celebrated Spanish auteur. What Henry doesn’t know is that he has a fame-obsessed superfan of his own. Henry is a gleefully over-the-top antihero and Foulds cranks up the tension admirably without ever resorting to any bunny-boiling clichés. Still want to be famous? Read this first.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
The latest from Foulds (In the Wolf's Mouth) is an outstanding and unyielding exploration of celebrity, fame, and all its attendant obsessions. Kristin is recently divorced and living alone in the Philadelphia home she once shared with her ex-husband, who's since moved on to his third marriage. The one thing that gives her joy in "her new, ruined life" is the British TV show The Grange and its irrepressibly handsome star Henry Banks. In London, Henry has no idea Kristin exists and is eager to move on from the small screen. Between starving himself into the kind of ugliness necessary for the lead role in an acclaimed Spanish director's new movie and partying with models and rich heirs in Qatar, Henry's star is rising and he is about to launch into the highest stratosphere of fame. Kristin's infatuation with Henry, meanwhile, becomes an obsession, and she boards a flight to London to try to get as close to him as she can. When Kristin and Henry's paths cross, to devastating effect, Kristin must contend with the dissonance between the reality of Henry and her fantasies of him. Foulds's novel is fun, smart, and tense, part psychological drama about media-driven obsession and part razor-sharp social critique.
