I was provided an eArc from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

4/5 stars

I absolutely loved this book it sucked me in right away. The narration with the main character really worked well. The story really took its time setting the scene and building up the world we were in and none of it was boring. The premise of the book and the idea of being sleepless really amped up the intrigue of this book. The writing in this book really fleshed out the pandemic in a way that it feels realistic, possible even as a future reality.

I also enjoyed the reveals and twists in this book, not all of them surprising but they all worked well together to build a cohesive plot and a conclusive ending. If anything, it made me enjoy the book more to be able to say “I knew it!”

It was quite hard to follow all the characters, there are a lot of detailed ones and the author writes them well. I say this is leaning more into a character driven plot which is typically the style I enjoy. There were definitely times where logistics of it all kinda pulled me out of the world a bit which is why I’m rating 4 out of 5 stars.

Overall, I can’t wait to get my hands on a finished copy of this book. The cover is great as well as the chapter break images. I can’t wait to see more from this author!

A super unique concept that was executed just as well, The Sleepless kept me engaged from the start. It's an excellent addition to any scifi/thriller reader's library.

The book has interesting concepts that are quite unique, but I felt like a lot of plotlines were repeated too much and it threw me off at times. The overall storyline doesn't have a lot of surprised and the anti-capitalistic sentiment like I've heard it before and could have been explored in a more distopian way perhaps.

I really liked this one! It was very unique, entertaining and creative. The sci-fi and mystery aspect was captivating and I enjoyed Jamie's character.

This is definitely a read for science fiction fans that like to explore dark, unanswered and philosophical questions. It's both haunting and engaging, a true could-not-put-it-down.

Thank you to NetGalley for providing me with this ARC!

I really enjoyed this slightly sci/fi conspiracy mystery! The world and pandemic of the Sleepless sickness was very realistically drawn and I loved all the details of how the world had responded to this unusual illness. The mystery itself was a little slow to get going and it took a while for me to care about what had happened because I kept being distracted by Jamie’s life and past, but seeing as I enjoyed reading that world building I don’t think it’s too much of a negative. Generally a great read if you like your sci/fi - dystopia lite.

Thank you to the publisher and Netgalley for giving me a copy of The Sleepless to review.

Book CW: suicide, drugs

This book comes out on August 2, 2022.

I initially gave this book 3 stars but changed it to 4 once I'd given it some more thought. For me, the world of this book was much more interesting than its contents. We are in a post-pandemic world where a lot of the population is now "sleepless". These hyper-insomniacs never have to sleep, and now have a lot more time to do all the things they want to do.

Our protagonist discovers their boss dead, from an apparent suicide, though he suspects something more is lurking underneath.

Overall, this book was fine, especially if you love mysteries, thrillers, or crime novels. We follow Jaime who is searching for the truth about his boss' death in a world where he feels he doesn't really belong due to being sleepless.

I thought the world of this book was stellar. I loved learning about what life was like after the pandemic occurred, and the changes in society to cope with this sudden change in the population. However, it was only about 1/3 of the book. If it had been entirely about the world with the same set of characters, it might have been a five-star read for me. The mystery of it all was just not interesting for me, as I really didn't care why the boss died. For some people though, this might be the opposite case.

Overall, if you love mysteries set in different worlds than our own, this is a great pick for you.

I'm going to preface this review by saying that I love cyberpunk as a genre, but have yet to come upon a book that would rub the itch. Dissatisfied with what most modern attempts at this vibe had to offer, I turned to other media in hopes that a suitable entry would reveal itself with time.

And Victor Manibo delivered.

I haven't even finished reading the first chapter before I just knew that this is it. The sci-fi cyberpunk novel with all the compartments of the genre (social issues, big (at least somewhat evil) corporations, and big questions, all dressed in a cool, badass hat of futuristic technology) that I had been waiting for. The prose is smooth and reads as a detective novel should, smoothly and with little unnecessary interruption. The worldbuilding is incredibly compelling and convincing from the very start.

If you like sci-fi (or want to try it out), I can't recommend this book enough. I really hope we'll get to see more from this author soon.

The Sleepless is a cleverly written, unique exploration into hyper capitalism, productivity, unchecked technology, and mental health. I thought it was thoughtful, loaded with suspense, and complex world building, I was very intrigued by the level of backstory in terms of the world and how The Sleepless came to be. The Sleepless is a whodunit novel that readers will stay up all night to finish.

Manibo has created a deeply intellectual novel that explores the common existentialist question:

“What if we had more time?”

What if we never had to sleep, for instance? What would that mean for us? For those we love? For history? For culture? For politics? For the environment?

Humankind has always been obsessed with legacy. With time. With immortality. And Manibo’s book is centered on what that obsession might mean for a modern, diverse society.

Manibo’s answers to all these questions are successful, in my opinion, because he manages to root the answers in a world that feels concurrent (despite technically being set in the future). I could see this happening. I could believe it. And this is because I’m given a solid social, cultural, and political framework that felt relatable. If I woke up tomorrow and was told that Manibo himself is sleepless and that this is his way of breaking the news to us, then I wouldn’t bat an eyelash. I’d say “duh!”

Moreover, Manibo also succeeds at providing answers that consider all angles. There is no antagonist and protagonist here. There are just individual people believing in whatever they believe in, for whatever personal reason. Just as in real life. It’s a stark reminder that politics are made up by individuals. Politics is all about what individuals want, and how they achieve it via allies and opposition. It works on a much more singular scope than what it pretends to do, and Manibo reminds us of this.

If we delve into the actual plot of the book, Manibo specifically addresses how capitalism exploits the existentialist fear of “so much to do, so little time”. He addresses toxic work culture, unethical business practices, and corrupt politicians. He also highlights the sustainability debate and how a world of sleepless people will negatively impact the environment.

But this isn’t just a book of high stakes; it’s also a book of low stakes.

The low stakes are the personal stakes of the protagonist, Jamie, a journalist who is thrown into a murder investigation. The novel is a whodunit scenario in which Jamie must solve the details of the murder to prove his innocence in the matter. The murder is of his boss and mentor, meaning that Jamie’s arc is largely centered on loss and grief. Throughout the book, Jamie must decide what he’s willing to personally sacrifice for professional success. He goes from being a workaholic who is in denial of his situation, to a workaholic who attempts to save what few personal relationships he has left (alongside his freedom and life, of course). He must decide how selfish he wants to be, and how selfless he needs to be in order to turn the tide around. These are existentialist choices in their own right, albeit of a smaller scale, but they make you care about the book as a whole.

I’ve talked a lot about politics and plot so far, but this is a very character-driven story at its core.

Being character-driven, the pacing is also on the slower side. Especially for a whodunit plot. It’s less “piecing different plot elements together” and more “personal revelations that alter the plot and thus the mystery”. Basically, we care about this world because we care about Jamie. Not the other way around. And Manibo expertly unveils Jamie’s backstory at just the right pace for a character-driven narrative, weaving it seamlessly together with his relatable sci-fi worldbuilding.

And this, of course, reinforces the point I made earlier, namely that politics are made up by individuals, and Jamie is one such individual.

Even if you don’t like reading about politics, you will like reading about Jamie.

Actual rating: 4.5

I received an eARC of this book via Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

What's that? A reader who generally does not enjoy sci-fi actually loves a sci-fi book? I thoroughly enjoyed The Sleepless from start to finish. Set in the not-too-distant future, this murder mystery that borders on being a thriller asks the question, what if there is a pandemic that makes about a quarter of the population unable and unneeding of sleep? What would the repercussions be in terms of public health, how big corporations would respond, how work-life balance would shift, and how the media would portray such a phenomenon?

Despite not being able to mentally keep track of all the characters, the fact that this story held my interest from start to finish says a lot about this book. The main character is a compelling narrator, not necessarily because he is an endearing character but because his thought process and the way he views his many different relationships were so interesting to follow. I also found the dialogue to be realistic and the themes that this story touches on to be thought-provoking. The pacing of the book was also nearly perfectly executed with each chapter unraveling the mystery just a little bit more without feeling like the reader is being forced to turn the pages the way most thrillers do. I honestly would love to see this book adapted as a film since reading this felt almost like watching a Jason Bourne movie, though less edge-of-your-seat.

I will definitely be keeping an eye out for any future works from Victor Manibo. He's definitely an author to watch, especially in the speculative thriller scene.

I requested this one as I liked the cover and the description. Unfortunately it didn’t grab me as I’d hoped. I didn’t connect with the main character and his story, as I read I just couldn’t care about the story, although I appreciated the concept.

This literary leaning sci-fi with a strong mystery through-line reminded me yes, I am depressed. Manibo has a fantastic, well-crafted novel here that will no doubt take off for fans of the genre.

What if, a pandemic causes a quarter of the world to not require sleep at all. That’s the exciting premise of Victor Manibo’s debut.

The Sleepless drew me in immediately, and left me thinking long after I had finished it, which is the best kind of book.

In this near future world, those who are sleepless are incredibly productive, and the envy of those who require sleep. But the core of this story is a wellcrafted mystery.

Jamie Vega is one of the Sleepless, and a reporter, who is the first person to find his boss and mentor dead in his office. The police think it's a suicide but Jamie, convinced it is not, sets off on a journey to find the real killer. The twist at the end is a refreshing surprise.

The world building is very real, especially around how the Sleepless are shunned, how entire industries mushroom around them, and how they get at least some rest.

Thank you to Erewhon Books and Netgalley for providing an ARC of this great debut.

The title and description immediately attracted my attention. It is twenty years in the future, and a percent of the population throughout the world develops the ability to go without sleep. This has serious ramifications as people who are awake 24/7 will inevitably put a strain on resources — more food required, more fuel and energy needs. This in turn leads to worldwide discrimination of the Sleepless as they are ostracized and quarantined by the global community. When this story opens, the balance has shifted and this group is now identified by society as high performers with the ability to work multiple jobs and strengthen the economy. At the same time there are terrorist groups and other factions who see danger ahead.
If this book had focused on this battle in society and the Sleepless as a metaphor for other kinds of social stratification, it would have been a powerful cautionary tale. Unfortunately, the author chose to concentrate on the personal story of Jamie, an investigative reporter who joined the Sleepless by taking an illegal pill. As the story opens, he has come upon the body of his boss and is trying to determine if he committed suicide or been murdered due to his reporting on government corruption.. Much of the developing mystery depends on conversation and description rather than action, and in the world of the future with so much personal technology, there is lots to describe to the reader.
This would work better, I think, as a movie with rapid fire scenes filled with robot cars and futuristic architecture. Instead it tended to bog down as Jamie tries to avoid capture by police and corporate forces. To be successful as a story of personal danger and vengeance, the main character has to be sympathetic, but Jamie radiates more anxiety than charisma and I just couldn’t get on board. And, frankly, I never bought in to the idea of people wanting to be awake forever. Even for an insomniac like me, sleep is a respite and reward I would not want to give up.

Interesting premise, great storyline, characters that make you want to follow. I will definitely be reading more by this author. I read this in one sitting.

In this fantastic debut we follow Jamie, who after a traumatic loss, finds his boss dead. The story grips you from the beginning and doesn’t let you go. We learn and investigate along with Jamie to find out the truth about the death and the sleepless secret. Such a wonderful book. Utterly unique, exquisitely crafted and quietly powerful. I loved it and want everyone to read this novel!

A complex sci-fi/mystery blend - the second chapter reminded me so much of Wanda Morris and ALL HER LITTLE SECRETS, but in the future. Jamie Vega works as a journalist for C&P Media. He is Sleepless--a few years ago, many people became unable to sleep as a result of an unexplained virus. Jamie has used the extra time to learn new hobbies and, of course, keep up on his grueling work. When Jamie reports to work one morning to find his boss, Simon, dead, his first instinct is to solve the apparent murder. But the cops think Simon killed himself, and a complicated investigation follows. Meanwhile, Jamie is looking to possibly break another story while dealing with some shady people. To say more would be a spoiler, but the book becomes wide in scope with devastating consequences if Jamie doesn't break the case. The world-building is fantastic, and I was most interested by the futuristic parts and the virus explanations. I will be interested to see what Manibo writes next!

Books like THE SLEEPLESS remind me of why I love mysteries with unique settings—whether they be SciFi, historical, or just far-flung from my midwestern American life. Add in the hook of sleeplessness brought on by a pandemic (or possibly illicit drugs...) and I was sold on this book before I even picked it up.

THE SLEEPLESS would appeal to fans of Blake Crouch’s speculative premise-driven novels because Manibo knows how to grab hold of a cool idea and absolutely run with it, delivering on the “fun and games” the reader is looking for. It felt like Manibo anticipated a lot of the questions readers might pose (“Could a sleepless person still pass out?” “What happens to their metabolism?”) and answered them subtly throughout the story.

The mystery in THE SLEEPLESS was also quite compelling, although it felt a tad convoluted to me at times—lots of political/media business machinations that I found myself less invested in than the “howdunit” elements and the psychological trauma (and complex relationships) of the main character.

Overall, this was a memorable read and I’m definitely hoping to read more by the author in the future.

It’s safe to say that in the third year of the COVID-19 pandemic people understand all too well how disruptive these kinds of events can be.

No longer solely an artefact of post-World War One history, pandemics are very now, very real and something that we all fully understand can upend the status quo, change perspectives and alter worldviews in ways that few other things can.

It’s thus all but inevitable that pandemic-centric novels are going to be in the ascendancy, capitalising on the new appreciation we all have for the fragility of the concept of normalcy, but it is doubtful few will wield as potent a hand as The Sleepless by Victor Manibo, a skillfully-executed, utterly immersive story of one man’s quest to clear his name, reclaim his soul and hopefully save the world in the process.

Think that’s too much to cram into one momentum-fuelled novel? Think again.

With a mastery that hints at a rich future in novel-length storytelling, Manibo manages to be both the architect of a propellant narrative rich in mystery, conspiracy and intrigue and the sculptor of some truly affecting character moments, many of which centre on the protagonist, Jamie Vega, a member of the Sleepless cohort, 25% of the human population who, thanks to a yet-to-be-fully-explained virus, no longer need to sleep.

On the face of it, it’s a boon for those who contract this mysterious condition, freeing them up to do more, work harder, and undertake all kinds of leisure pursuits, all free from the need to devote a third of their time to recharging the batteries.

But with every massive change in the status quo, and make no mistake the presence of about 2 billion people no longer requiring sleep is a seismic shift in everyone’s understanding of what it means to be human, there comes the good and the bad, with the Sleepless the target of vitriol and bigotry with many viewing them as less of an evolutionary step forward and more of a step into a scary unknown.

Jamie is one of the Sleepless but unlike almost every else in this select group, he did not come by it naturally, biohacking himself into Sleeplessness, seduced by the allure of all the time he’ll gain to further burnish his already luminous journalistic career at C+P Media.

It looks like he’s taken the right step until his driven and ambitious boss Simon is found dead one night, and what is initially treated as a suicide becomes something far darker with Jamie fingered as the main culprit for his boss’s demise.

Alas, Jamie can’t remember what he was doing on the night of Simon’s death, his memory holed significantly by what turns out to be a deleterious side effect of biohacking himself into Sleeplessness – an inability to make or retain new memories, a terrifying loss that cuts to the very heart of self-identity and individual humanity.

In Sleepless, Manibo effortlessly combines mystery thriller with existential crisis and ruminations on the state of the world, both as it stands and as it might become, and exploration of the toxically corrosive effects of capitalism run amok.

Throw in characters for whom queerness is a natural and normal part of life – that their lives are queer is simply treated, refreshingly, as nothing remarkable, they just are – and you have a near-future set novel which is personal, political, thrilling and intimate all at once.

It’s a really remarkable piece of work, helped along by the fact that Manibo constructs the action with tautness and solid steps to A to B to C that makes sense while investing each of the characters with a rich, raw humanity which embellishes the action elements, granting them a humanity they might otherwise lack.

This is pedal-to-the-metal storytelling with heart, a visionary piece of future peeking that relies on some unsettling current trends which doesn’t encompass just the awareness of how disruptive pandemics can be, but an innate understanding of how humanity simply doesn’t handle change well and how there will always be forces arrayed to make the most of these disruptions and not in the best interests of all concerned.

By placing an everyman-not-everyman at the centre of the action, someone who is flawed but well-intentioned, talented but prone to making missteps and being a victim of his runaway emotions, Manibo has made Sleepless a novel to which everyone should relate, even if dystopian sci-fi may not necessarily be their first genre port of call.

Sleepless is really, when it comes down to it, a story about humanity.

How it excels and fails, soars and crashes to earth and how in doing so, takes things that could be good and finds way to twist and bend them into ugly self-serving ways.

Sleeplessness could be an endless boon for humanity; true it carries risks as far as environmental load on the planet goes – you’re effectively adding a third a third to the population impact which given current trajectories on climate change, destruction of the natural world is far from okay – and does create some societal inequalities but it also allowed people to do more, create more, be more.

Unfortunately, it also stirs up all kinds of bigotry and mistrust, stirring the ugly beast at humanity’s core up in terrifyingly awful ways; the only bright spot are Jamie and the people he encounters who are trying to do good where others are clearly cultivating the darker angels of our nature.

As novels go, Sleepless is up there with the best – rich in immersive mystery-laden storytelling and arrestingly fully-formed characters, redolent with clever ideas and sage observations about the good and bad aspects of humanity and the society we create as a result, and all too aware that it is up to each of us to do something if we see things heading where they should not be, all of us responsible for where humanity as a whole finds itself, not just now but well into the future.