The narrative follows Graham, an overextended man suffering from severe insomnia who plunges into a deep, two-hundred-year trance in eighteen ninety-nine. When he finally awakens in a futuristic London, he discovers that his modest fortune, augmented by compounding interest, has made him the absolute owner of the entire world. The society he beholds is a dizzying metropolis of colossal scale, where towering structures and moving roadways dwarf humanity, and the population is sharply divided between an ultra-luxurious ruling class and an oppressed, blue-clad labor force. A secretive White Council currently governs in his name, attempting to keep him sequestered or eliminate him to preserve their power.
However, an ambitious revolutionary leader named Ostrog orchestrates a massive uprising to liberate Graham, using the legendary 'Sleeper' as a unifying symbol to rally the discontented masses. Graham is thrust into the center of a violent civil conflict that overthrows the old regime, but he soon realizes that Ostrog simply aims to replace one tyranny with another. As he explores the hidden miseries of the under-city, he faces a profound moral crisis regarding his true responsibility as the titular master of humanity.
