Publishing in March 2025 by Bloomsbury Publishing
Categorized as literary fiction, The Dream Hotel resonates more as a near-future work of horror that should be accepted as this generation’s 1984. The novel follows Sara Hussein, as she is pulled from security at LAX while returning home from a conference abroad. The Risk Assessment Administration’s algorithm has flagged her as having an increased potential for committing a future crime. Safety measures dictate she must be kept under observation for twenty-one days. All she needs to do is abide by the rules at the retention center in order to lower her risk score and she’ll be released.
As simple as that might seem, it becomes a challenge when the guards are incentivized for identifying infractions and extending their retention periods. As the rules seem to bend, and never to the favor of Sara or the other dreamers held in retention, days turn to months with no sign of release. After all, a dream where Sara’s husband falls into a river while she watches is indicative of her desire to kill him, is it not? The algorithm must be trusted because in the end, “The data doesn’t lie.”
While the data doesn’t lie, it also “…doesn’t tell the whole truth.” and neither do the people in retention with Sara. When a woman is held for the minimum number of days, and is then released without a hitch, it leaves Sara pining for answers. As she digs through any sources she can find in her limited computer time, a rebellious idea begins to form, one that will put Sara and the others in retention on a collision course with those profiting from their stay.
The Dream Hotel is not only a stark look at the next generation for-profit prison system, it is about humanity and how much of ourselves we give away with a remarkable amount of indifference. “Entire generations have never known life without surveillance. Watched from the womb to the grave, they take corporate ownership of their personal data to be a fact of life, as natural as leaves growing on trees.”
As a frequent traveller who has watched an increasing number of airports implement biometric screenings and facial recognition software in the name of efficiency and security, my nerves buzz every time the TSA takes my photo. This, coupled with the increasing dependency consumers have on smart phones in an age where our data has become the most valuable commodity to tech companies, makes Laila Lalami’s words all the more haunting.
The Dream Hotel filled me with a range of emotions, from despair at the very real prospects of this being our future (I write this from the United States where just this morning the new administration has moved to dismantle the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, while an algorithm-loving megalomaniac is infiltrating our financial systems), to rage at the unjust and inhumane actions by the retention-center workers.
But it also filled me with hope. Science fiction often predicts the future, from Neuromancer to 1984 to credit cards and the lunar landing. While The Dream Hotel is an amazingly woven cautionary tale, just by existing it means people are thinking about these possibilities, and if more people are aware of what’s happening, then maybe we can make a change before our corporate overlords turn our subconscious dreams into actual nightmares.