Goodreads Monday is a weekly meme started by @Lauren’s Page Turners but is currently hosted by Emily @ Budget Tales Book Blog. This meme is quite easy to follow – just randomly pick a book from your to-be-read list and explain why you want to read it. It is that simple.

This week’s book:

The Dream Hotel by Laila Lalami

Blurb from Goodreads

From Laila Lalami—the Pulitzer Prize and National Book Award finalist and a “maestra of literary fiction” (NPR)—comes a riveting and utterly original novel about one woman’s fight for freedom, set in a near future where even dreams are under surveillance.

Sara has just landed at LAX, returning home from a conference abroad, when agents from the Risk Assessment Administration pull her aside and inform her that she will soon commit a crime. Using data from her dreams, the RAA’s algorithm has determined that she is at imminent risk of harming the person she loves most, her husband. For his safety, she must be kept under observation for twenty-one days.

The agents transfer Sara to a retention center, where she is held with other dreamers, all of them women trying to prove their innocence from different crimes. With every deviation from the strict and ever-shifting rules of the facility, their stay is extended. Months pass and Sara seems no closer to release. Then one day, a new resident arrives, disrupting the order of the facility and leading Sara on a collision course with the very companies that have deprived her of her freedom.

Eerie, urgent, and ceaselessly clear-eyed, The Dream Hotel artfully explores the seductive nature of technology, which puts us in shackles even as it makes our lives easier. Lalami asks how much of ourselves must remain private if we are to remain free, and whether even the most invasive forms of surveillance can ever capture who we really are.

Why I Want To Read It

Happy Monday everyone! Well, technically it is already Tuesday so happy Tuesday everyone. Time does fly fast. We are already in the last week of February. The third month of the year is just over the horizon. Sadly, time does not bide its time as it takes its natural course. It doesn’t wait for anyone. We can neither slow it down nor freeze it. So, how has your year been so far? I hope that 2025 is showering everyone with positive news and blessings. If nothing is going in your favor, I hope you get to have a reversal of fortune in the coming months. A lot can still happen. We have time to pursue our goals and dreams. On another note, I hope everyone started the work week on a high note. I hope you all had a good start to the workweek. I hope everyone makes it through the week. More importantly, I hope everyone is doing well, in mind, body, and spirit, not only this week but for the rest of the year.

Reading-wise, I have quite some lofty goals this year. For one, I have already set my reading goal to 100 despite historically initially setting my reading goal at a more realistic level, or in other words, achievable. Still, I wanted to challenge myself and push my limits. I wanted to build on the reading momentum I gained during the pandemic years. If the past three years are any indicator, I can surely complete at least 100 books this year. I also plan to read more translated works to reduce the gap between books originally published in English and translated literary works. Despite the new year, some things never change. As customary, I am kicking off the blogging week with a fresh Goodreads Monday update, which has become an essential part of my weekly blogging ritual over the past few years.

Since the start of the year, the books I have been featuring in this weekly update are books that will be published this year that I am looking forward to. Most of these books are included in my 2025 Books I Look Forward To List. Among the writers I encountered for the first time while searching for books to include on this list is Moroccan-American writer Laila Lalami (Arabic: ليلى العلمي). I just learned that she has quite a prolific career that started in the mid-1990s. Her literary criticism, cultural commentary, and opinion pieces have appeared in The Boston Globe, Boston Review, The Los Angeles Times, The Nation, The New York Times, and The Washington Post, among others. In 2005, she published her first book, Hope and Other Dangerous Pursuits. She has since published a plethora of works that gained her several accolades, including a Pulitzer Prize nomination for The Moor’s Account.

This year, Lalami is set to make her literary comeback with the publication of The Dream Hotel. It was among the books that have been a familiar presence in similar most anticipated 2025 book release lists. This naturally piqued my interest, hence, its inclusion to my own list. The premise also is quite interesting as it is a fusion of current events and dystopia. This unique plot is making my imagination churn. I am looking forward to what the book has in store. I am also looking forward to the prospect of exploring a new name and a new territory. The Dream Hotel is set to be released on March 4. For now, I just hope to obtain a copy of the book. How was your Monday, Tuesday rather? What books have you added to your reading list? Do drop it in the comment box. For now, happy Monday and, as always, happy reading!