This book! It's been a long time since I read something so laugh-out-loud funny and heartbreaking at the same time. It's the rare high-concept novel that grabs you by the heart -- think The Time Traveler's Wife, only hilarious. I thought about this novel when I wasn't reading it, couldn't wait to get back to it, and missed it when I reached the end. I can't wait to read the next book(s) in the series.

Thank you Netgalley and the Publisher for my ARC in exchange for my honest review. This was an enjoyable book.

I honestly didn’t really care about this book and I was sad because i was really interested in it. I tried to pick this up a few times and had to sadly realize that I wasn’t going to pick it back up.
DNF at 30%
Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher.

Really enjoyed this novel. The writing flowed and the characters were depicted very well. Couldn't wait to find out what happens next.

This book... ripped me apart. Coming from a stand point where you unfortunately connect to the bad things that have happened to a character, it makes it really hard to read some books. This book was hard, but it was real and honest. It was eye opening and truthful to what happened and how it affected Ness. This story broke my heart, for everyone involved. But it was SO worth the heartbreak. If you read it, you will know. And I really think everyone should. Okay, on a happier note.. the banter at the beginning of this book is hilarious. The book had me in its grips, within the first page... the descriptions, the imagery, and the humor, are the best I've read in a long time. Just trigger warnings included, be prepared for what you're walking into.

This story is definitely a different concept from any I've ever read. For me it was just okay. Some of the characters were quite unlikeable and I struggled to get through bits. Overall an interesting read.

This book was definitely not what I expected, specially when you look at the cover and title of the book, but was I Wrong!
I absolutely loved this book, every character was described in such a unique way. Real page turner. Will definitely recommend this book to everyone

Thank you very much Netgalley for giving me a chance to read and rate this wonderful book

This book is so interesting!! I have never read anything like this before. She’s basically cheating on her husband in her dreams. And she loves it. What will happen next?? Readi t and find out!

I really liked this book. In the beginning it was a little slow but once it started it didn't stop. Everyone felt like real people and I liked that. I didn't think it was going to go to sci-fi but it was very interesting.

Sleeping together was a very unique story. It tells the story of Vanessa, a woman who starts taking a drug at her work to try and help her sleep. However, what follows is some pretty weird side effects including interacting with one of her coworkers who is also taking the drug. The two develop a relationship during their dreams. Vanessa, however, also develops an addiction.
It was very interesting, but the ending left me wanting more. I wanted to see more between Vanessa and Pete because I felt like he got the short end of the stick. Also, that ending felt pretty ambiguous so I'm seriously hoping the second book follows these same characters so I can get a more final ending.
Definitely a fascinating premise.

A very strange premise for a book so kudos to the author for thinking of this idea! Don’t want to give too much away but was quickly turning pages to find out what was happening.

While it did keep me reading I found a few of the characters annoying and unlikable. Some of the situations didn’t seem believable ( and I’m not talking about the main premise).

All in all a bit of a strange story but it might be your cup of tea if you want something different!

I received a copy of this from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

“Sleeping Together” by Kitty Cook is the first book in the series.

Nessie has nightmares of babies.

When her husband, Pete, one day suggests he wants to start a family. Ness is reluctant at his suggestion, avoiding the topic by escaping to secretly take photos and curb her sudden panic attacks (both of which her husband is unaware of).

It is clear that she has secrets. Secrets she is not willing to part with. And those that are ultimately undoing her causing her to making have trouble sleeping.

She find Altan, her co-worker and semi crush, stealing Morpheum - a trial sleep medication from their company, WellCo. Ness considers turning him in. However he convinces her that the drug works wonders. Desperate for sleep and to feel better, she demands a sample from him to try herself.

Morpheum allows for one to enter a realistic scene in a dream environment. It has other side effects which is ignore when Ness awakes after the first drug and feels fantastic. She continues to using the drug as a coping mechanism.

Only when Altan and Ness share a passionate dream that they realization the boundless potentials of the drugs. They start experimenting with the dreams, and pushing the boundaries.

The more time Ness spends in the Morpheum-induced dreamworld, the more willing she is to swop the reality of her life for a feel good dream. Altan and Ness also become close. Super close.

She is torn between the love for her husband and her can’t-be-ignored-and-increasing feelings for Altan.

Overall, I enjoyed the author’s style of writing, although darker than my usual. An interesting concept. Drama, first loves, new loves, dream states. I sat up reading through the night. The book put me through the motions and on point to laugh, sigh (“Oh so romantic” sigh) and cry.

I was torn within the love triangle.

Rationally, I wanted to shake Ness and point out that she scored big time with her husband. I fully believe Ness should have woman-ed up and had a deep conversation with Pete, allowing him to get to know the dark places of her soul and her passions.

On the other hand, idealistically speaking...
For her to be happy; by doing the things she wanted to; to become more who is was before the rape; to travel; to take photos. To love passionately. Altan got to see all of her. Mentally and emotionally.

The former was safe and secure, while the latter was an unknown adventure.

[Note: Book does contains rape, sexual assault and addiction]

** I received a copy of Sleeping Together by Kitty Cook via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

#SleepingTogether #NetGalley

I have no clue what made me request this initially, but I’m glad I did. This was quite the surprise. It kept me fairly hooked all along and the plot line was not even remotely what I expected.

Ness isn’t sleeping. She’s having nightmares. About babies. Her husband Pete is wanting to talk about starting a family. And how’s she’s having nightmares. When she catches her coworker, Altan, stealing pills from their drug trials he decides that she should try some to see if she can get a good nights sleep. The side effects of Morpheum include headaches and nausea. Oh and possibly mind melding, as Altan and Ness quickly discover. While she is getting great sleep, and having AMAZING dreams, the stress of having two men in her life, trying to decide if she wants a baby, oh and her terrible boss, are starting to weight on her. Is Morpheum really all it’s cracked up to be?

Ok let me start by saying this - I FLIPPING LOVED THIS BOOK! I couldn’t put it down (I actually fell asleep reading it one night because I didn’t want to stop). It is so well written, flipping from Ness to Altan’s journal and back, and always leaves you wanting to know what is going to happen next. It draws you in to Ness’s story, to the point where you are rooting for her to make particular decisions and you are also getting confused about what really is reality. Malcolm will make you angry, you’ll want to learn more about Altan and have your heart broken for Sam. It is fantastic and I honestly cannot recommend this book enough!

Trigger warnings for rape, sexual assault, addiction, and infidelity

I picked up this book because it was listed as "Romance/Women's Fiction" on NetGalley but has decisively unromantic jacket copy. I've seen left-my-husband-for-a-better-guy story lines work before, usually because the husband is awful and undeserving of his lovely wife, and I was curious to see how it would be handled here with a science fiction twist.

Vanessa and her lawyer husband are going through a rough patch because he wants to have kids and she doesn't for reasons connected with being gang raped in college. She hasn't told him this, though, so he becomes understandably frustrated with her elliptical reasoning.

She's stressed so when she catches her kinda handsome coworker Alton stealing experimental sleeping pills from work she takes some, hoping she'll find peace. Instead Vanessa and Alton end up having hot, sexy, shared dreams.

Up to this point I'm not thrilled, but I'm mostly okay. Vanessa desperately needs to see a professional to work through past trauma, but I get that she may not be ready or able to do that. She has a loving husband who is doing his best to meet her in the middle, and there's one episode of dream sex before Alton and Vanessa realize the dreams are shared, but then they stop. We're still in romance territory, even if it's a bit darker than my usual.

But after that things pile up plot-wise. It ends up being a story of addiction, full stop. Vanessa spends more and more time asleep, traversing dreamscapes with Alton while ignoring her sweet, reasonable husband at every turn. Her boss makes work a living hell complete with sexual assault, she cannot function without taking the drug every night, and it becomes a story of adultery and being tempted by a young, unproven guy over the husband who has treated her amazingly well and whom she still feels a deep love for.

One common definition of a romance is that it's a story where people form a loving relationship while overcoming difficulties. This, however, is a woman falling into the dark pit of addiction and finding a somewhat handsome guy at the bottom. She needs all kinds of help, help that her husband is ready to find and provide, but running off with the guy who for all intents and purposes is her drug dealer is more appealing.

I feel like Cook is trying for a hopeful, happily-ever-after-for-now ending but I don't buy it. Vanessa doesn't learn anything and runs away from problems without solving them. She still needs to get clean and doesn't have much desire to do so. She throws away one of the few good things in her life... and this is the uplifting ending. GAH.

Those are the plot problems, but I have more. I am not a fan of the writing. Cook drops similes all over the place and they're weird and distracting rather than insightful. Characters quoting movie lines at each other is seen as the highest form of humor. It'd make sense in YA, maybe, but not here.

The cast of characters is small considering the page length, and even so the only one that's fully developed is Vanessa. Alton turns from an annoying, coarse, "slacker cool" guy in real life into the sweetest guy in her dreams (literally). There's no trigger for this change other than the fact that it's more socially acceptable to flirt with a married woman in dreams than reality. It calls to mind the YA trope of guys being borderline mean to girls because they "like her so much", which is kind of toxic and definitely not my thing. Also, his entire personality can be summed up in three simple traits, which isn't a good look for a main character.

On top of all this the end of the book ignores a whole bunch of stuff. Questions are left unanswered, relationships are tossed up in the air, and narrative threads are dropped never to be picked up again. This is the first in a series but the teaser for book two hints that it'll be with different characters, so I'm not sure what the end game is here.

All of that being said, there is some good stuff here, especially in the first couple of chapters. I appreciate Cook examining the dynamic of a relationship where one partner wants kids and the other doesn't. She also explores the differences in how men and women approach the world with regard to their personal safety. It was a bit too on-the-nose by the end for me, but some of the beginning parts are well done.

Overall I'm mad this was in the romance section because it's not a romance, but putting that aside I don't consider it a successful work of general fiction, either. Only pick it up if it's exactly your thing and you can get along with the trigger warnings.

This book was awesome and a surprise 5star read.
This deals with some heavy topics: assault, abortion, drug use and addiction as well as divorce and relationship problems.
I loved the characters and the whole story was a wild ride!
It's hard to compare this to any other book, but if you like contemporary romance with some heavier topics this will be right for you.

Thank you Netgalley for providing me with a copy.

I'm so glad I stumbled upon Sleeping Together because it was fantastic. I'm a sucker for a pretty cover and the summary sounded like a dramatic romance with a touch of sci-fi, so I was instantly sold.

Life is messy and no one is perfect. Cook did a great job of showing how messy reality can be with characters that aren't insufferable. I've read many books where the authors construct flawed characters, but fail to develop them in a way that makes them relatable and/or likeable. When Ness falls into a downward spiral with Altan, taking Morpheum, and ignoring her issues with Pete, I couldn't help but sympathize with her and want her to have a happy ending. I enjoyed Altan's occasional perspective and seeing his character develop as he got more involved with Ness.

My favourite aspect of the novel was reading about Ness and Altan's dreams and seeing how their subconsciouses intertwined with reality. There were also plenty of twists that compelled me to keep reading. At one point, I thought this could've derailed and gone into sci-fi territory, but I'm glad this was more of a drama-romance than a sci-fi. This would've been a 5-star read if there was a touch more romance or sexiness, but otherwise, Sleeping Together was a really great read. I'm not sure how this would work into a series, but I'm looking forward to reading the next one.

What a weird, trippy, fever dream of a book. I’m not even sure how to describe it without spoilers, so I’ll just say that it was vivid and disturbing and strange, but the characters felt very real. It reminded me a little of Connie Willis, where science and reality get mixed up with a kind of human-made magic. This is a debut novel and I’m very interested to see where the author goes from here.

I think that the concept of this book was very interesting and captivating. Two coworkers start experiencing the same dreams and also meeting in them after having taken the sleeping pills their company is testing. I enjoyed reading about Vanessa and Altan's dream adventures, they were pretty funny and also full of beautiful places that the two main characters got to (re)discover together.
I did not feel particularly attached to any of the characters and this probably ruined the reading a little bit for me. The only time I felt some kind of empathy towards Vanessa was when she talked about what happened to her in the past and her struggles. I truly felt sorry for what she had to go through. Altan was okay, whereas Pete was the character that I really could not stand.
I wish the book would have had a better ending. I did not understand this book was actually part of a series, I thought it would be more of a companion series but I was wrong. This book as an open ending and I'm not the biggest fan of that.

Description
Vanessa Brown is having nightmares: about babies. Ever since her husband, Pete, mentioned he wanted to start a family, Ness has been trying to convince herself she’s stoked to spawn despite her inability to keep a cactus alive—and a decade-old secret she doesn’t like to remember. So when she catches her slacker-cool coworker, Altan Young, stealing sleeping medication from the pharmaceutical company they both work for, she decides to try the pilfered pills to finally find some rest.

But side effects of Morpheum include headaches, nausea, and possible mind melding—a fact Ness and Altan stumble upon when they share the same freaky sex dream. (Awkward.) Now, these two colleagues are joined at the brain by night, experiencing dozens of fantastic sleep-staged adventures courtesy of a little imagination and a whole lot of drugs.

With the stress of being caught between the men of her literal and figurative dreams (not to mention her nightmare of a boss), Ness starts to enjoy snoozing more than being conscious—and the company of her work husband more than her real one. If she doesn’t wake up and smell the coffee soon, her dreamy escape could become a dirt nap in this feisty debut novel about the dark side of dreams’ coming true.

THANKS, NetGalley for the advance copy for review.
Sleeping Together was a pretty good book. I just found the characters more not people I could connect with. An interesting idea for a book. I rated it 4 stars.