Billed as “a high concept thriller for fans of Inception and The Adjustment Bureau”, Sleepwalkers is the debut novel from writer Tom Grieves. With a fifteen-year television career behind him, his most recent cult credits include two episodes of Being Human’s fourth series.
The tale begins with Ben, an everyman who has a steady job as a mechanic, a loving wife and two children who he adores. Yet Ben is plagued by nightmares of torture and violence; dreams that find him waking to unexplained scars, scratches and pain. At first he believes that he simply needs more sleep, but soon Ben finds himself descending into a pit of paranoia and self-destructive behaviour.
At the same time we meet Toby, a sensitive teen who suffers similarly while at the same time as coping with the school bullies. His situation draws the attention of bookish English teacher Anna, who suspects Toby may be the victim of abuse at home and puts her job on the line to try and find out.
These two parallel but disparate stories collide as both discover inconsistencies in their lives that cannot be easily explained. They go on to realise that nothing about their lives can be taken at face value. As the instinct to discover the truth draws them together, it also appears to send them running into the hands of those responsible.
Providing a complex and at times moving tale, Grieves strips away the layers of the story with some excellent rug-pulling moments; given his background, it is no surprise to say that his writing style very visual and easy to follow.
The pre-publicity for the book seeks to invoke shades of Inception, but there’s a healthy dose of Jason Bourne in the mix too, as well as a fair dose of the comic. At one point the characters drive about in a stolen car searching for a metal shutter door recalled from a half-remembered dream.
As they endeavour to escape their pursuers, they encounter a group of people who have dropped out of everyday life. The portrait of their supposed counter-culture existence is fairly damning, with the group shown as psuedo-intellectuals who are all talk and no practical use whatsoever.
This introduction to this group comes through perhaps the most unlikely character of the piece, Terry, a teen who has dropped out of school and yet seems to possess Spooks-like abilities with computer technology. To be fair, their pursuers are pretty nifty on this front too, but we suppose this goes with the conspiracy theory genre.
The novel ends in a surprisingly downbeat fashion, though it is not without hope. In many ways, it is a story of loneliness and the futility of resistance as we cope with the ever-increasing influence of corporations in our lives. It also has plenty to say about memories, the value we place on them and how they influence our actions.
While brutal in places, Sleepwalkers is a highly-readable, intelligent and thought provoking thriller.
Published on Thursday 2nd August 2012 by by Quercus.