Week 10

In Karen Russell’s Sleep Donation, citizens all across America are suffering from an insomnia crisis. Many of these terminal cases of extreme insomnia have resulted with death. But a donation agency called Slumber Corps has found a cure, a treatment where people can donate their sleep.

The voice of this piece comes from the perspective of the main character, Trish Edgewater. Trish is pretty clear as a character, but in terms of “voice,” I found that some parts were confusing in terms of who was talking, specifically in the beginning office scene. But in this case it didn’t really matter who was talking, we knew it was people in the office who were all having a conversation. Overall, I really like the way the story is told, and the voice of the piece. I also really enjoyed Karen Russell’s Vampires in a Lemon Grove, which we read in class. Though these were both by Russell, the voices of the pieces are different from each other. Russell is a talented writer, whose work I will keep an eye out for in the future.

The genre of Sleep Donation is definitely fiction. But to narrow it down can be difficult. It could be almost fantasy, because of it’s imaginative new disease. But it is definitely a dystopian novel. The story takes place in near-future America and the whole country has been affected by the insomnia “disease,” leaving society and its government suffering. Sleep Donation fits the definition of the dystopian genre- a society that has been negatively impacted in some way, shape, or form by a bigger force. Other books that I have read in the dystopian genre are The Giver, Margaret Atwood’s The Handmade’s Tale, and The Hunger Games. Like Sleep Donation, they all take a problem in our society and write about our future society suffering from that problem. It serves as almost a warning. Russell’s novella is very creative. Insomnia is a problem for some people in our society, but here in the story, most of society is suffering- and dying from it. The world that she created is so compelling it draws you in to read more about our society and this new “disease.” It’s creative because of the society she has created and how society is dealing with it- with sleep donation drives. The idea of a sleep disease is both mind boggling and concerning.