Adrian Barnes (1963–2018)

The concept sounded great but the execution was poor. I struggled through this book, thank goodness it was so short or I probably wouldn't have finished it. It's praised as being a great literary work, so that's probably why I didn't enjoy it. There were too many literary references and not enough story.

Paul is so unlikeable as a character and he doesn't seem interested in anything I actually wanted the book to answer, like how or why this has happened. Why people are behaving so ridiculously and what connection, if any, his book has to it. He never seems to apply any rational thought to it.

Then there's the absolutely disgusting way he treats his partner. He doesn't seem to actually care about her, and because of this we don't really get to see her descent. He seems to forget about her completely whenever he's not with her and when he is he doesn't try very hard to engage with her and help her.

Everything that happens is ridiculous and unbelievable, I can't imagine that any of it would happen just because people didn't sleep.… (meer)

What if the worldstopped sleeping?

It was a great premise for the book. And the story was interesting. Watching the world descend into madness day by day. Setting what people do and how they cope. Honestly I'd love to see this book made into a video game similar to The Last of Us.

Unfortunately the author spent too much time rambling about inconsequential nonsense like the origin of words.

On top of that the nation character was not likable or relatable at all. When you make your character a self proclaimed people hater, then give them no good qualities, you can't expect a person to like that character.

Then there's the ending. I won't spoil it, but it was the routine of laziness. I'd honestly had it end with some contrived deus ex machina than what we got.

Worth reading once, but that's it.… (meer)