George O. Smith 1 hr 22 min read

Thomas Barden sleeps fitfully, plagued by a recurring dream he somehow knows is more than idle subconscious rambling, an important thought that won't quite struggle up into the light.

George O. Smith's 1948 story is a clever hard-SF and psi-powers tale of a persistent, meaningful dream. Sharp, ingenious golden-age SF. Read it for a story where a man's uncanny recurring dream proves to carry a hidden message, and unraveling it reveals that he is being used as someone else's catspaw.

In its time

Published in 1948, during the 1940s, the golden age begins.

Reading it

1 hr 22 min read (a novella, a full arc in one sitting or two).

Illustrated by

Paul Orban