One night in an isolated college town, a first-year student stumbles into her dorm room, falls asleep --- and doesn’t wake up. Her roommate, Mei, cannot rouse her. Neither can the paramedics, nor the perplexed doctors at the hospital. When a second girl falls asleep, and then a third, Mei finds herself thrust together with an eccentric classmate as panic takes hold of the college and spreads to the town. A young couple tries to protect their newborn baby as the once-quiet streets descend into chaos. Two sisters turn to each other for comfort as their survivalist father prepares for disaster. Those affected by the illness are displaying unusual levels of brain activity, higher than has ever been recorded before. They are dreaming heightened dreams --- but of what?

Julia and her family awake to discover that the rotation of the earth has suddenly begun to slow. The days and nights grow longer and longer, gravity is affected, and the environment is thrown into disarray. Yet, as she struggles to navigate an ever-shifting landscape, Julia is also coping with the normal disasters of everyday life. As she adjusts to the new normal, the slowing inexorably continues.