Book Review: LucidDreamTM by Brooks Hansen

 

LucidDreamTM by Brooks Hensen

305 pages, Paperback

Expected Publication: January 15, 2026 

This is a rare case when I get an arc from an author I admit was new to me, a novel out of the blue. The interesting thing is that this novel does fit into a certain zeitgeist going on with fiction reacting to the explosion of AI. I just read/reviewed and interviewed Ken Liu for his very mainstream techno thriller “All That We See or Seem.” These two novels really complement each other, and reading them so close together, it is impossible for me not to bring up that novel.

Brooks Hensen is an accomplished author, so I feel bad having not heard of him, but I am an SF and horror guy, so I will blame my ignorance on that. It helped that I went into this one blind. It appears from a quick search that Hansen is known for writing historical fiction. While I am sometimes skeptical of writers who don’t have experience in the genre slumming it in our beloved genre, I didn’t know that when I was reading. I didn’t think Brooks Hansen was an SF writer, but I got the impression that he wrote weird or surreal fiction. That said, I have only this experience to judge.

LDTM, as I will refer to it throughout the review, is science fiction; it was described as having a speculative element, but all those genre definitions have more to do with marketing than judging the art at play. It is a narrative that unfolds from many points of view and a few stylistic experiments. Just like Ken Liu’s novel, this one plays with the idea that AI can and will be working with our dreams and unlocking some craziness. 

Liu wrote a very mainstream thriller, and Hansen experimented with structure, but maintains prose that delivers recognizable hallmarks of good SF. If this is his first time in that toolbox it is impressive. It is filled with ideas and commentary without losing sight of the story. 

Let me point out a passage 50 or so pages deep that I found very evocative…

“Way back when, he (Gomez) was a product of the seventh-gen Halo franchise, which was never your cup of tea. You met him in ‘Dream Uruk, not as Julian Maas. You were his corner-man in a
pretty epic barroom brawl with the king. Gomez was no posh. He was a clean-up hitter. Could hammer-throw a tank, if need be—a granite bull, now visible as a glowing orange butt-tip, a firefly hovering, dipping, dimming, then flaring hot again as if to signal that yes, I am
alive. I inhale, see? Followed by the blue dispersing plume.”

One of the neat aspects of this book is the various styles and tones that Hansen experiments with. I enjoyed his ability to create a vibe, characters, and not lose sight of the mission. Which seems to me to be a statement about art and AI. Much of it exists in that zone of the creative where dreams and our imagination collide.

 So what is it about AI and dreams that makes the intersection a moment of zeitgeist in SF? LDTM and Hansen have a similar point to Liu, but explain it maybe a bit more directly. In both novels, dreams are products. Ken Liu saw an influencer and was modernizing PKD’s concepts of Mercerism. This novel seems to hit on the space where our brains in the form of dreams and stories create something machines can’t.

" ‘Dream is pretty state-of-the-art when it comes to such things translating carnal knowledge into virtual experience. And all the same skills and attributes that make you such a good player in general—and that Julian embodies for you so seamlessly—will serve you very well in these more intimate engagements. Fluidity of motion, emotion, intuition, reflex, imagination, openness, and trust even. On that basis, and without getting too explicit, it may be said that on this occasion—down there in the underglobe of the enormous hourglass the two of you spilled through however long ago it was—you will definitely pass. You will get an extremely good grade, in fact, credit to Bel as well, who will turn out to be one helluva partner, surprise surprise."

Art and the human experience is the juxtaposition with the AI uncreation is at the edge of all the satire, all expertly rolled out.  I laughed a few times but mostly enjoyed the commentary, and found myself enjoying the creative invention.

"The storm agrees with that. The wind howls like a wolf, pelts the roof with what sounds like a bucket of marbles. God Almighty’s right, but there was something else about it, too. You understood the whole thing was an hourglass—the beach, that is, and the crypt underneath. You understood as you were falling through. They are counting down, you write, as the images keep coming—the tumbling, the taste, plunging. The sand on her hip."

“Something else,” says Patel, “were you aware that most ‘Dreamers under thirty say that they identify more with their sim-selves than with the biological?”

Ultimately, LucidDreamTM is a story about the conflict between humanity, the arts, and the digital-dream-like false reality. Hansen is playing with the question of what is real? What is art? What is a dream if the thoughts themselves are artificial? Excellent stuff.