I read this science fiction book several years ago and would like to
find it again: it's a collection of short stories about a futuristic
society where people strive torward immortality by "sleeping" for
years or decades and spending only a fews days awake at a time. The
richer the person, the more they can afford to sleep and the longer
they live. The "oldest" person is called "mother", and she is only
awake one day every hundred years, or something like that. The only
other thing I seem to recall is that the "sleep" in induced by some
drug and the person's memories are stored in some sort of "bubble".
This is not a novel -- I think it is a collection of short stories
that never quite made it into a full novel. Thanks for any help!

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Request for Question Clarification by pinkfreud-ga on 22 Jul 2006 18:49 PDT

It always helps to have a timeframe. Approximately how old would you
estimate this book to be? Do you remember when you read it? The
nationality of the author? Any additional details that you can recall
would be useful.

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Clarification of Question by crispyx2-ga on 22 Jul 2006 20:13 PDT

I'll esimate it's 1980's or early 90's, not from the 21st century. I
read it in the last 5-10 years.

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Clarification of Question by crispyx2-ga on 22 Jul 2006 20:14 PDT

Oh, and the author is almost certainly north american or british.