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Sleepwalk
Sleepwalk: A Novel | Dan Chaon
11 posts | 11 read | 6 to read
A high speed and darkly comic road trip through a near future American with a big hearted mercenary, from beloved and acclaimed novelist Dan Chaon Sleepwalks hero, Will Bear, is a man with so many aliases that he simply thinks of himself as the Barely Blur. At fifty years old, hes been living off the grid for over half his life. Hes never had a real job, never paid taxes, never been in a committed relationship. A good-natured henchman with a complicated and lonely past and an LSD microdosing problem, he spends his time hopscotching across state lines in his beloved camper van, running sometimes shady, often dangerous errands for a powerful and ruthless operation hes never troubled himself to learn too much about. He has lots of connections, but no true ties. His longest relationships are with an old rescue dog with posttraumatic stress, and a childhood friend as deeply entrenched in the underworld as he is, who, lately, hes less and less sure he can trust. Out of the blue, one of his many burner phones heralds a call from a twenty-year-old woman claiming to be his biological daughter, Cammie. She says shes the product of one of his long-ago sperm donations; hes half certain shes AI. She needs his help. Shes entrenched in a widespread and nefarious plot involving Wills employers, and continuing to have any contact with her increasingly fuzzes the line between the people Will is working for and the people hes running from. With his signature blend of haunting emotional realism and fast-paced intrigue, Chaon populates his fractured America with characters who ring all too true. Gazing both back to the past and forward to an inevitable enough seeming future, Sleepwalk examines where weve been and where were going, and the curses and joys of being human that will never change, no matter how far we travel to dodge them, or how cleverly we hide.
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Mogoeg
Sleepwalk: A Novel | Dan Chaon
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Pickpick

A road novel set in the near future with a somewhat shambling & surprisingly naive narrator, despite the fact that he has a job as a henchman (or minion?). This is a story that is all about the journey - the underlying mystery doesn't really pay off, but I didn't mind too much - its full small pleasures & surprisingly touching moments. It reminds me a bit of an early William Gibson, crossed with what I would call redneck-noir. I liked it.

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Ruthiella
Sleepwalk: A Novel | Dan Chaon
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Pickpick

I‘m counting this for #Booked2022 “New in 2022”.

This is my second read from Chaon and I think he might be a new favorite. His books are creepy and complicated in a way which really appeals to me. This one is about an aging hit man/cleaner/courier who‘s so off the grid, he doesn‘t even have a legal name. When he discoverers he has a daughter, he thinks he‘s being conned…or is he? Set in a believably discomforting near future America.

Cinfhen Ohhhh, sounds great!!! #stacked 2y
Reggie This sounds really good. 2y
Ruthiella @Cinfhen I hope you like it! 🤞 2y
Ruthiella @Reggie The first book I read was super creepy and head scratching 2y
Cinfhen I liked Ill Will - really unsettling 2y
58 likes3 stack adds5 comments
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Ephemera
Sleepwalk: A Novel | Dan Chaon
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Pickpick

I love Dan Chaon‘s work and this new book is excellent. Set in the US in some not so distant future, the main character is a 50 year old man named Billy who works for a mysterious company doing various shady chores. He has a dog named Flip and he travels in a small RV he has named Guiding Star. That‘s all I‘ll say except you should read this book immediately. Ten stars.

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Addison_Reads
Sleepwalk: A Novel | Dan Chaon
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Mehso-so

I feel my enjoyment of this may have suffered some by reading it so close to Mickey7. For some reason my brain kept comparing the main characters from both books and Mickey kept coming out on top.

This book was a bit of a messy wild ride with crazy characters traveling through a dystopian world. Although I enjoyed it there was just something about it that kept me from fully connecting. But again, I think that's more me and timing than the book.

38 likes1 stack add
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chronoreads
Sleepwalk: A Novel | Dan Chaon
Bailedbailed

Sleepwalk seems like an in-depth character study of the protagonist; however, I was well into the novel without feeling like the story had advanced, so I was unable to finish. If you are looking for a slow burn with world building as it relates to the main character, you may have more success with this one.

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RamsFan1963
Sleepwalk: A Novel | Dan Chaon
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✅ Hurricane Lizards and Plastic Squid, The Martian Race and The Dawn of Everything
✅ Most recently, Stephen King's Later
✅ Sleepwalk by Dan Chaon (5/24/22)

#weekendreads @rachelsbrittain

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TracyReadsBooks
Sleepwalk: A Novel | Dan Chaon
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Pickpick

I‘m not entirely sure what I just read but it was really well-written, a wild ride that kept me turning the pages. Will Bear lives off the grid, doing tasks for a nebulous outfit, never asking questions & keeping his head down. One day a girl claiming to be his daughter calls & things get complicated fast. Who‘s lying, who‘s telling the truth? A dystopian future that is all too believable. I suspect this one won‘t be for everyone but I liked it.

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TracyReadsBooks
Sleepwalk: A Novel | Dan Chaon
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A little bit of bookish fun this morning, something that never happens—reading the tagged book, I turn the page & there is my neighborhood, including the street I live on, which is a “you have to know where it is to actually find it” sort of place, described in exacting & accurate detail. The descriptions are so good the author must have been here.

Has that ever happened to you? Have you ever stumbled across your neighborhood in a book?

AmyG Oh wow. No but I came across a town near me...and I think I know the house it mentioned. 2y
Prairiegirl_reading My irl book club recently read a book that had a very specific address in Winnipeg, where I‘m from. I google street mapped it and there was a beautiful old home that was totally in character with the neighbourhood. We all wondered what the significance was to the author since it was so specific. 2y
TracyReadsBooks @Prairiegirl_reading I wonder too! I think it‘s fantastic when an author gets it right, when it‘s clear they‘ve done their research or are genuinely familiar with the place they are describing. 2y
TracyReadsBooks @AmyG How cool is it that the description was so good you even recognized the particular house?!? Love it! 2y
AmyG It was a work of Non-fiction. But I must have passed her house a dozen times if not more. 2y
26 likes5 comments
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TracyReadsBooks
Sleepwalk: A Novel | Dan Chaon
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#WeekendReading

It‘s a three day weekend (yay!) so lots of time for reading. The plan, so far, is to finish the tagged book and then read Curious Toys and The Secret Life of Albert Entwistle. After that, I‘ll have to see.

@Andrew65

Andrew65 Hope you had a good weekend of reading. 2y
23 likes1 comment
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TracyReadsBooks
Sleepwalk: A Novel | Dan Chaon
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Today‘s reading…

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Sara_Planz
Sleepwalk: A Novel | Dan Chaon
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Looking forward to this one!