Reviewed by Annika
TITLE: When All the World Sleeps
AUTHOR: Lisa Henry & J.A. Rock
NARRATOR: Greg Tremblay
PUBLISHER: Riptide Publishing
LENGTH: 12 hours, 11 minutes
RELEASE DATE: January 12, 2017
BLURB:
Daniel Whitlock is terrified of going to sleep. And rightly so; he sleepwalks, with no awareness or memory of his actions. Including burning down Kenny Cooper’s house – with Kenny inside it – after Kenny brutally beat him for being gay. Back in the tiny town of Logan after serving his prison sentence, Daniel isolates himself in a cabin in the woods and chains himself to his bed at night.
Like the rest of Logan, local cop Joe Belman doesn’t believe Daniel’s absurd defense. But when Bel saves Daniel from a retaliatory fire, he discovers that Daniel might not be what everyone thinks: killer, liar, tweaker, freak. Bel agrees to control Daniel at night – for the sake of the other townsfolk. Daniel’s fascinating, but Bel’s not going there.
Yet as he’s drawn further into Daniel’s dark world, Bel finds that he likes being in charge. And submitting to Bel gives Daniel the only peace he’s ever known. But Daniel’s demons won’t leave him alone, and he’ll need Bel’s help to slay them once and for all – assuming Bel is willing to risk everything to stand by him.
REVIEW:
When All the World Sleeps is dark, emotional, gut wrenching and real. It might skirt the edge of plausible, but the superb writing by Lisa Henry and J.A. Rock along with the exceptional narration by Greg Tremblay made you believe. They made it real. Every horrible and painful moment.
Many of us have the luxury to take the essentials for granted; food, water, electricity, sleep. Now imagine that one of them is the stuff of nightmares. That’s every day for Daniel Whitlock. Every day, all day revolves around how he’d cope with sleeping that night, to exhaust himself just enough for his body to shut down, but even more how he’d keep himself contained and keep him from doing something terrible. Because he’d already lived through that once – and had the scars to prove it.
Daniel will definitely break your heart. The lengths he went to keep himself from sleepwalking, the desperation and pain of it all. It’s very humbling. One of the things that touched me the most was how almost every single person in Logan truly hated Daniel. The animosity reeked from them, and every single barb pieced true. They hurt, badly. It’s no wonder that Daniel never believed his own worth. I mean even his family treated him like the dirt under his shoes.
I liked the way Bel was portrayed. At first he too subscribed to the “Daniel is crazy” mantra like the rest of the town. But he was also open enough to look deeper, beyond the surface. And what he saw was a kind-hearted and broken man who had no one. I liked how he took Daniel under his wing, trying to help him out. How he started to fall for him. But also that he was human, questioning if it was enough to love him. If he could really go through the terrors and sleepwalking with Daniel indefinitely. If he was strong enough. There’s no question that they were good together, and they had some sizzling chemistry. But this book wasn’t about them, not really.
It was about the town, about hate, secrets and lies and the length some goes to, to keep them buried. This book kind of reminded me of a movie from the 90’s; She Fought Alone. The basic set up might be different, but the way a whole town protects one of their own and dooms another making their lives hell was just the same. Fearing anyone different, putting the blame on the victim and protecting and celebrating the perpetrator. It made me sick to my stomach, but the worst part is that it does happen RL. That’s the truly scary part.
This dark tale was performed by the one and only Greg Tremblay and he did an incredible job bringing it to life. It was a painful listen, start to finish and I spent a lot of it listening with tears in my eyes. Tears for all the pain Daniel lived through, for much he loathed himself and genuinely believed he didn’t deserve any happiness, and that signing up as a slave 24/7 to a violent so called dom was an actual option. Tremblay made you experience Daniel’s trepidation each time every time he woke up, not knowing what he’d done that night – and who he’d done it with. Tremblay narrates with a lot of emotion, but also with the respect this story was due. He will leave you wrung out in the best of ways.
When All the World Sleeps is probably not a book for everyone, but well worth the listen.
RATING: 
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