Sleepwalk is a high speed and darkly comic road trip through a near
future America with a big-hearted mercenary, from beloved and acclaimed
award-winning novelist Dan Chaon.
"[Chaon] does madcap well and likes his characters, even the
killers--especially the killers."--The New York Times Book Review
A New York Times Book Review Editors' Choice
An NPR "Book of the Day"
A USA Today "Must Read"
Sleepwalk's hero, Will Bear, is a man with so many aliases that he
simply thinks of himself as the Barely Blur. At fifty years old, he's
been living off the grid for over half his life. He's 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 a passion
for LSD microdosing, 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 he's 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 that has
post-traumatic stress and a childhood friend as deeply entrenched in the
underworld as he is, who, lately, he's less and less sure he can trust.
Out of the blue, one of Will's many burner phones heralds a call from a
twenty-year-old woman claiming to be his biological daughter. She says
she's the product of one of his long-ago sperm donations; he's half
certain she's AI. She needs his help. She's entrenched in a widespread
and nefarious plot involving Will's employers, and for Will to continue
to have any contact with her increasingly fuzzes the line between the
people he is working for and the people he's running from.
With his signature blend of haunting emotional realism and fast-paced
intrigue, Dan 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 we've been
and where we're going and the connections that bind us, no matter how
far we travel to dodge them or how cleverly we hide.
