Summary: When the whole world is gripped by the Nightmare Virus, claiming you as well, the only thing you can do is search for a cure...not matter the cost.

Notes: Cain Cross (Talk about a memorable character name!) must find the cure. The virus started out as Imagiserum that allowed you to experience a Dreamscape. Like virtual reality. But it mutated, sucking everyone who had taken it into a inucurable illness. After it apears, you have 22 days to live. Then you fall asleap, never to wake, until your body dies. I like how the stakes were set, then raised, then raised again. I read the whole book in one day. page turner? Yes. Read it before bed? Not if you are prone to nighmares. I liked how Light and Darkness were used in this book. One thing I would have liked to have been a bigger part was the moral problem with taking the Imagiserum in the first place: escaping to an imaginary world is all well and fine...in moderation. The Dreamscape is all an illusion! As anything, it can be used for evil or for good. But it is a very dangerous slippery slope. 

Age of Main Character: Young adult.

Violence: Colloseum games, Cain kills someone and feels terrible, getting struck by black lightening, swordfights, cougar and other wild animal attacks, looting, death.

Romance: Not much. Cain likes a girl, but it doesn't go any further. Also, Cain is worried that someone will take atvantage of that girl while she is unconsious. 

Scary Themes: The Virus sucks you into a dark, sticky tunnel where darkness is a weight. The citizens love watchign the colluseum games, where people die. There is one group of people that, well "regenerate" when they die in the dream world. That is, they come back as themselves even though they should be dead. (For everyone else, when one dies, one is dead). The one group, they still suffer the pain and trauma of dying again, and again, and again. Also, there are corrupt leaders and an uncontrollable fear of death.

Genre: Science Fiction