[microbes]

The time travel thread (and another thread) got me thinking about a book I read ages ago.

The plot goes something like this: People with the means (meaning money) have themselves placed in stasis for a period of time, then awaken for a short time and take care of what ever investments and such they have, then go back into stasis. One person was living for something like a week out of each year, and the Queen was only living something like one day every 100 years, which let her rule for thousands and thousands of years.

[Ward]

possibley Orson Scott Card's Worthing Saga: the novel itself is followed by many short stories or novellas that dig into the details of the society Worthing left, and that certainly sounds like one aspect (even talks specifically of the Queen).

[Yobmod]

It also sounds similar to one of the stories in Zelazny's Doors of His face, Lamps of His Mouth - about the 'set', who extend there life by stasis, and only come out for the party season (and find their investments have accumulated). Their leader is an old women who collects porcelain dogs.

[microbes]

I think you nailed it Ward. I'm almost positive it was The Worthing Saga, right down to a few shorts after the main novel.

[rainswept]

If it was indeed ages ago, you might have read Card's stories under the title Capitol (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capitol_%28collection%29).