Dawn breaks over Vancouver and no-one has slept the night before, or almost no one. A few people, perhaps one in ten thousand can still sleep, and they've all shared the same strange, golden dream. A handful of children still sleep as well, but what they're dreaming remains a mystery. After six days of absolute sleep deprivation, psychosis will set in. After four weeks the , the body will die. In the interim, panic ensues and a bizarre new world arises in which those previously on the fringes of society take the lead.

One couple experience a lifetime in a week as he continues to sleep, she begins to disintegrate before him, and the new world swallows the old one whole...