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One of the first of her kind, Leisha Camden is born without the urge to sleep. She is a Sleepless: a genetically modified super-intelligent being who shows little signs of aging and can theoretically live forever. She is part of an evolutionary step forward for the human race, brought about by human minds, not by natural processes. It is the early 21st century and humankind is realizing its dream of immortality.
Once just a great curiousity, she becomes a victim of racism and hatred from the masses who cannot afford to become Sleepless or who feel that the Sleepless are unnatural people who have no business being a part of the human race. Leisha and her fellow Sleepless gather together while rising in the ranks of economic leadership, becoming powerful in many parts of the world. It is the Sleepless versus the governmental powers that will try anything to take away their freedom and place in society. Leisha, now a lawyer, has to prevent both sides from destruction while in the throwes of her kinship with the other Sleepless.
Liesha is thrown into a world that, for the most part, resents what she represents. A Sleepless who can accomplish and compete on a level that is beyond normal human capacity.
Nancy Kress portrays this vividly. Leisha grows up to become a lawyer as the Sleepless build a fortress-haven called Sanctuary. Kress' ability to deal with every-day predjudice and jealousy is shown greatly in this book. It's a sidelong look at the way a nation and a world percieve an unusual and inherently superior people. Once upon a time, nations have dealt with a tiny minority rising from the depths of curiosity to the levels of power, becoming targets of mistrust and injustice through lack of understanding and simple blindness on the part of the majority.
Kress hones in on these issues from every concievable angle, forging an epic tale that echoes close to home through childhood and the reality of responsibility. This is not a book of genetic processes, it's a novel about the world in which we live today.