The Little Sleep (Mark Genevich, #1) by Paul Tremblay

The Little Sleep (Mark Genevich, #1) Reviews

• 
  Paul

  It's my first novel, so I'm terribly biased!
• 
  Melki

  Mark Genevich yearns to be a hard-boiled PI, just like Philip Marlowe. And he tries. He talks the talk. He wears a hat. He's as hard-boiled as he can be, considering he lives with his mom. And has narcolepsy. Well, I suppose when you fall asleep at the drop of a hat, you need all the help you can get.
  
  Every time I sleep - it doesn't matter how long I'm out - puts more unconscious space between myself and the events I experienced, because every time I wake up it's a new day. Those fraudulent extra days, weeks, years add up. So while my everyday time shrinks, it also gets longer. I'm Billy Pilgrim and Rip Van Winkle at the same time...
  
  Genevich also suffers from cataplexy which leaves him temporarily unable to move, AND like an Ambien-zombie, he occasionally does "things" in his sleep. He ends up second guessing himself, as in "did it happen or did I dream it?" As far as handicapable detectives go, this one is certainly unique.
  
  The book has all the trappings of a classic noir novel - a mysterious female client, naked photos that could ruin a reputation and a career, and a wealthy, powerful man with hired goons - BUT...the writing is too humorous to be true noir. Noir-lite, perhaps?
  
  Genevich is a likable character, and I hope his next outing will involve a less predictable case.
  
  Two things I really loved? His constant wise-cracking -
  
  "I don't think we have more time, kid. There's a red car driving around my house. It's been by four times this afternoon already."
  
  I say, "Relax. Calm down. Red cars won't bother you if you don't bother them."
  
  And his mom, Ellen. She's constantly walking around in an ancient t-shirt and clown pants. She reminds me of someone. Oh, yeah...me!
  
  
  
  
• 
  Char

  Mark Genevich is a private investigator with narcolepsy. What a great premise, right? THE LITTLE SLEEP delivers on that premise!
  
  Crime noir, (indicated by that title), with a twist! For once, it's a P.I. who does NOT have a drinking problem. However, the problem he DOES have is narcolepsy and throughout this novel we learn all about it and its effects. Catalepsy which sounds terrifying, is just one of the symptoms:
  
  "a medical condition characterized by a trance or seizure with a loss of sensation and consciousness accompanied by rigidity of the body."
  
  How does a man, dealing with falling asleep, falling into a waking comas, (which is what catalepsy sounds like to me), hypnagogic hallucinations, (more on that later), solve mysteries? You'll have to read this to find out!
  
  Not going to lie, at first Mark Genevich got on my nerves. Why does he call his mom "Ellen? Why is he smoking when he could fall asleep at any moment? As the story progressed though, he grew on me. How could he possibly solve a mystery when he fell asleep WHILE the person hiring him was in his office? How can he solve a mystery when he's not even sure that person existed, (enter the hypnagogic hallucinations, which occur just before he falls asleep)? How can he solve anything when he can't even drive? All of these questions are answered with a great deal of sarcasm and self-deprecation.
  
  What was really surprising though, was Genevich's effectiveness. Despite all of these problems holding him back, it turned out that he had a steely backbone. This man is not going to go down without a fight. (Unless, of course, he falls asleep.)
  
  THE LITTLE SLEEP was quite an entertaining read! Genevich was a unique character with depth, and I'm sure some will come out of this read hating the guy's guts. But I thought he was funny and interesting, and in the end? Much more compelling than the mystery itself. For this reason, I will definitely be moving on the next book in the series: NO SLEEP TILL WONDERLAND. I'm already looking forward to meeting Genevich again in the future.
  
  Recommended!
  
  Available everywhere tomorrow, but you can pre-order here:
  https://amzn.to/39fD2zZ
  
  *Thanks to the author, the publisher and NetGalley for the e-ARC of this book in exchange for my honest feedback. This is it!*
• 
  Jaksen

  I read this book because I enjoyed 'A Head Full of Ghosts,' by the same author.
  
  First off, the book was witty, modern, filled with contemporary references, has an MC who calls his mother 'Ellen,' and was a quick and enjoyable read. The main premise is tricky, though, as it involves a PI who has narcolepsy. (He even drives a car from Cape Cod home to Dorchester while fighting off sleep. There was some absolutely great writing here; the guy knows his local geography.)
  
  The story is about some photos which turn up in Mark Genevich's hands, but he can't recall exactly who gave them to him or why. (Cuz he fell asleep either during or right after he got them.) So this puts into play how can a narcoleptic - a severe narcoleptic who is apt to fall sleep anywhere anytime for any reason - possibly be a private eye? Details are everything in this kind of a business, but the story fully explains that Genevich does most of his work off the internet. Okay, I was cool with that.
  
  But the narcolepsy adds an interesting angle as any anxiety-inducing situation can knock the guy out, making him super-vulnerable to all sorts of shady business by nasty crooks and characters. It gets a little stressful reading this in places, for example, when you know the guy is about to get beat up or possibly even killed and he's slowly ... drifting ... into ... never-neverland.
  
  Anyhow, the photos lead to a powerful DA, his daughter who gets kicked off a TV talent show (for having no talent), a hidden and maybe-porn film, secrets from his father's past, and the sometimes-helpful and always-critical Ellen, Genevich's mother. (She owns an antique store which could be the setting for its own mystery. Reminded me of scenes from novels by Doug Preston and Lincoln Child. I've been in stores like this!)
  
  So, for New Englanders who love New England cop-detective stories, the settings are spot-on. For everyone else, simply a great read with an entirely different take on the private eye/detective genre.
• 
  Krystin | TheF**kingTwist

  
  Book Blog |
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  I’ve tried a couple of times, with different authors, to read this kind of hard-boiled, noir private detective story and… it’s just not for me.
  
  That’s putting it nicely, which is unusual for me.
  
  So, to put it not so nicely, I think this particular genre is supposed to come across as classic, intense and pulpy serious. The private dick is a man of the streets and a man of law. He’s balancing his day-to-day life against the seedy underbelly he’s wrapped up in as he seeks justice and upholds the law by sometimes playing outside of its lines. OoOoOoOo so gritty and dark.
  
  But for me, it’s fucking goofy as hell.
  
  All I can think about it “Fast Talking High Trousers.”
  
  
  
  You can’t tell me I’m wrong! You can’t!
  
  But supposing I was…
  
  I never totally found my footing with this. On one hand, it’s almost a hard-boiled satire or a meta take on the genre, where the MC Mark Genevich wants to be a Fast Talking High Trousers P.I. so bad he’s forcing himself into the job even though he’s objectively terrible at it. He’s got the speech pattern down, he’s wearing the fucking hat, all he needs is a case that is more dangerous than boring property title searches. Ohhh, and he falls asleep because he’s a narcoleptic.
  
  Because of the sleep disorder, there are huge chunks of this book that may or may not have been some kind of P.I. fever dream. There are hallucination aspects that really only exist to confuse the reader probably because the mystery itself is pretty paint-by-numbers. All of that coupled with cataplexy and sleepwalking means I never totally knew what the fuck was actually going on, even by the end. Because it wasn’t clear, but also because I didn’t care all that much. I was so disinterested in the case, in the characters and in the vibe, that I was emotionally checked out.
  
  All of the classic P.I. noir elements were there – the mysterious female client, naked photos like we’re in Roger Rabbit, the hired goons who work for the powerful boss man – but all of it was so cliché. Like, just eye roll inducingly cliché. Not a fan.
  
  
  
  This isn’t a terrible book, but it wasn’t for me. The plot was dragged out, formulaic and everything else was kind of annoying.
  
  
  
  ⭐⭐½ | 2.5 stars rounded down
• 
  David

  The Little Sleep might as well come with a questionnaire stapled to its cover asking you to compare it to The Big Sleep, so I will oblige the marketing campaign by looking for connections: The settings have little in common (1930s Los Angeles vs. 2000s Boston), and there is a superficial plot connection (a daughter or two with a powerful father, pornography, and blackmail figure in the events of both books). But when you come to the novels' protagonists, things get interesting. The most obvious connection between Philip Marlowe and Mark Genevich is their preferred mode of communication: sarcasm. In general, the writing style of author Paul Tremblay is almost a parody of Raymond Chandler's hardboiled voice: the world-weary wisecracks and noir metaphors (categories that sometimes overlap) come in an unrelenting stream. There are so many of these touches in The Little Sleep that some are bound to fall flat, but the novel's strategy is to overwhelm: Readers will barely have time to smile or roll their eyes at a writerly flourish before the next one comes along.
  
  The important thing, though, is that The Little Sleep deals with more than solving a mystery and cracking wise, as did The Big Sleep before it. As a writer of mysteries, Raymond Chandler was plain awful. Critics excuse (and sometimes even praise) his convoluted plot lines because the critics are dazzled by the creation of Philip Marlowe, who ranks as perhaps the most fascinating character in the history of the detective genre (Sherlock Holmes notwithstanding). Similarly, the real attraction of The Little Sleep is Mark Genevich. Paul Tremblay's plot is mercifully simple compared to the messes that Raymond Chandler cooked up, but what kept me turning the pages of The Little Sleep was "Mark Genevich, narcoleptic detective" (as he is billed on the back of the book). I had expected that his narcolepsy would be played for laughs, but The Little Sleep is too smart for that. Genevich's struggles with his condition are of a piece with his Marlowesque voice: Like his hardboiled predecessor, Genevich is a damaged man with an arsenal of (mostly sarcastic) defense mechanisms, and he does not give up his secrets easily. So I will read the next Mark Genevich mystery for the same reason that I read the Philip Marlowe mysteries: not because I want to read a mystery but because I want to spend time with a fascinating character.
• 
  Sebastien Castell

  The Little Sleep by Paul Tremblay sits in the sweet-spot of my interest in crime fiction: the noir detective-with-a-problem (that isn't alcoholism). It's not that I mind stories about alcoholics, it's just the trope of the hard-drinking detective wears on me after a while. In The Little Sleep, Mark Genevich is a private detective suffering from multiple narcoleptic symptoms stemming from a car accident that has left him sometimes falling asleep at the worst possible times, occasionally hallucinating clients and enemies, and sometimes even finding himself awake but paralyzed. With all this on his plate, Mark finds himself caught up in a case of blackmail that isn't at all what it seems.
  
  Tremblay does a lot of things both well and boldly in The Little Sleep. He makes Mark Genevich's life exactly the kind of hell it would be given his circumstances. The car accident left him with severe facial deformity, his detective work is in no way sufficient to support himself – leaving him dependent on his mother, and his narcolepsy is no super-power-in-hiding. It sucks. Big time.
  
  The author also knows his noir stylings. Descriptions are emotionally vivid, full of cynical malaise about the world and the people in it, characters live inside the grey rather than black and white – and those that seem reliably evil have a very good reason for it.
  
  What held me back from enjoying the Little Sleep is that it does exactly what Tremblay intends: delivers a tale of a relentlessly depressive main character undergoing events largely beyond his control in a tale both horrifying and banal with an ending that leaves you with the same sense of dissatisfaction as that experienced by its hero. In that sense it almost feels more like a literary novel intentionally problematizing the genre precisely by leveraging its style and tropes and then forcing the reader to see them through the lens of what would more likely be true than what we're used to. In some ways it reminds me of Martin Amis's pseudo-noir, Night Train. However Night Train has the virtue that it's never blinding you to its intent and in that sense isn't trying to have it both ways. You read Night Train, you're going on a dark and troubling ride. The Little Sleep felt like it wanted to both subvert the genre while still asking you to read the next novel in the series. In this way it becomes kind of a slog in the second half. There's no real increase in the pace and the narrator continues to give excessively long descriptions of relatively simple things. There's an honesty to this in that, for the main character, time isn't really passing the way it does for us. However I still felt myself wishing he'd get on with it and stop telling me how a dirty couch represented all that was sad and humdrum about the world.
  
  I suppose could've skipped most of my review by simply telling you that The Little Sleep is a well-written book that's no fun. However I think for plenty of readers it's skilful subversion of noir tropes will be appealing and worth a try. I found myself by the end wondering whether perhaps the next books in the series must be a little more enthusiastic, but didn't feel a sufficient urge to find out.
• 
  Jocelyn

  I don’t like crime noir books - not even a tiny bit. I hate noir so much that if another book, say a thriller, has a narrative that has a ‘noir’ feel - I’ll skip it. I’m not even really in to books with a heavy detective voice. Sorry, can’t do it. I knew there was a chance I wouldn’t like The Little Sleep, buuuut by an author I really like, I had no choice but to give it a chance.
  
  I made it to page 50 and let myself off. DNF.
  
  I love Paul Tremblay - A Head Full of Ghosts is a brilliant book and probably one of the most frightening books I’ve ever read. Every sentence was outstanding. Therefore… I’ll leave this unrated.
• 
  Paul Eckert

  I had a few issues with Tremblay's short story collection, In the Mean Time, but overall I thought it was good enough to warrant reading his novels. The stories in that collection were full with quirky premises and characters that were more compelling that not.
  
  The Little Sleep has quirk, but only in its premise. Mark Genovitch is a private detective, but due to a head injury, now has narcolepsy and a messed up face. He usually handles small-time cases that involve the banal aspects of private investigation, something like property title searches. Then he winds up with nude photos of a woman, but due to his narcolepsy, he has no idea who gave him the photos, or why. Throw in a few red herrings, some bumbling mistakes, and pieces of a puzzle that fall into place in nice, orderly chronological order, and you have the sum of The Little Sleep, which amounts to being a by-the-numbers mystery with a sad sack leading man.
  
  Genovitch's narcolepsy felt less like a real characteristic and more like a plot device. He falls asleep when it's convenient to the plot, he has hypnogogic hallucinations that serve only to temporarily confuse the reader like a meaningless aside. The way Genovitch handled his business, it's a wonder that he had a business at all. The premise on which the story draws, that of a mystery client, shouldn't have been a premise at all if Genovitch was even half good at what he does.
  
  After spending an inordinate amount of time chasing a ridiculous red herring, a character who has almost zero impact on the plot, Genovitch starts to unravel the real mystery behind his client and the reason he was hired. As with most mysteries, a series of convenient coincidences and plot-forwarding clues are found. Tremblay tries to tie the mystery in with the relationship Genovitch had with his deceased father, but these sequences rarely worked, and Genovitch's father feels like another prop shoehorned into the plot to add meaning.
  
  It's not like this was a bad story, it just wasn't very interesting. I think some of it had to do with the way Tremblay narrates in the first person, which winds up largely being a series of mundane gestures and general observations and conclusions that the reader had already reached. Even the interesting parts where bogged down with extraneous descriptions and movements to and fro. There were a few funny parts that made me laugh, but on the whole the humor misfires and makes Genovitch look dumber than he is.
  
  If you like traditional mysteries that progress in predictable escalation with all the usual tropes, then you might like this story. I like a little more originality from the stories I read, and this one just didn't cut it for me.
  
  I listened to the audibook version of this story, and I think the narrator may have detracted from the story a bit. I envisioned the main character of this story to be a grisly, jaded man, but the way the narrator read he sounded like a notch away from being bright-eyed and bushy-tailed. The prose and the way it was read often had a dissonance to great to ignore.
• 
  Toby

  After reading Tom Piccirilli's Every Shallow Cut and finding myself enjoying the book's format as much as the content I went exploring the back catalogue of the Chizine Press for more interesting books by interesting authors. Amongst those that I shortlisted was Paul Tremblay, and I was sure I already knew his name from somewhere. Turns out I already owned The Little Sleep and had done for about two years without taking it off of my noir bookcase. The perils of buying everything you see.
  
  The Little Sleep, found in a supermarket book bin at 25% of the RRP, I half hoped for pastiche, half expected parody. This second half of my expectations would account for my hesitation in actually reading the book after buying it. I do hate exaggerated silliness afterall. But knowing that Tremblay had a literary grounding and had been considered worth publishing by a company who publishes weird, subtle, surreal, disturbing dark fiction and fantasy finally helped to push this little yellow book in to my hands.
  
  It's definitely a pastiche, the major plot is a reworking of a very tired noir device - important person trying to cover up bad thing from their past takes too much interest in a private detective's investigation - but a pastiche by somebody who probably isn't in love with the genre itself. Tremblay's private eye is a narcoleptic who often hallucinates and struggles to differentiate between reality and hallucinations. This is a nice, weird, interesting take on the down on his luck gumshoe who must tread a lonely path down darkened streets in to the black heart of man etc., and that alone makes it worth reading, but you're left with the feeling that it's a book that sounded like a good idea to an inventive author who thought anyone could write a private detective novel if you just follow a very simple formula. See the mediocre genre work of John Banville for a prime example. The formula is followed, the plot cliche regurgitated, the quirky protagonist underdeveloped as a character but overdeveloped in the one area that makes him a unique protagonist - the quirk factor - and the denouement happens before you even know it.
  
  Happy days all round if you like that sort of thing. You can't expect every writer who tries out genre fiction to care about the genre can you? It's hard enough just to get a cohesive story written with the right number of words and pages!
• 
  The Behrg

  A detective with narcolepsy, who also may or may not be hallucinating when awake? And who gets a job but was "asleep" when he received the case, not knowing what he was hired to do or by who?
  
  How can this not be an enjoyable read?
  
  "The Little Sleep" is a premise-driven novel, no doubt, and while it does give in to many of the cliches in the noir genre, it does so intentionally. Almost self-deprecatingly. Tremblay's created a character that's fun to watch, from his "condition" to his snarky attitude. Add the unreliable narrator element to the mix and this was just an enjoyable little novel to dive into, one that would make for an excellent transition to the screen -- big or small.
  
  Many of the turns and twists were predictable, so don't go into this expecting a superb or shocking mystery, but the ride in getting to these plot twists was still worth taking. Kudos to Tremblay for a very different kind of P.I. and adding flavor to an oft-tiresome genre. I'll definitely be picking up the sequel.
  
• 
  Adnamy

  Really 3.5 but I don’t know how to do half stars
  It was very interesting & had a seductive voice (audiobook) narrating which helped a lot. I did not predict the end, & read it in a hurry towards the finish as I was intrigued.
  It’s original & it’s also a sort of horror story - narcolepsy & the other symptoms scared me truly & were skillfully woven through the tale and made very important as health always is. It is your whole being - what you can do or not do … what you wish you could do but cannot. I liked this part of the book the most. Not to say it is inspirational, as those type of books often annoy me intensely- why can’t you do anything when a person with only one working little finger can accomplish Everest feats. They can; tour, build houses, make presentations etc but you have trouble getting out of bed 🛌- with 10 working fingers. OMG I’ve gone off the track … good book
• 
  John

  I absolutely loved this book! Obviously, the title is a take-off on Chandler's series fearing Philip Marlowe; where that P. I. is suave, self-assured, in command, and tough, Mark ... isn't. He was in an accident (details not given) years earlier, leaving him somewhat disfigured (how much isn't clear, but references are made), as well as narcoleptic -- those "little sleeps" that come on without warning.
  
  Without re-hashing that actual plot, here's basically what to expect: Mark receives "compromising" photos of a woman whom he believes to be the Boston district attorney's daughter (an old friend of his dad's). They aren't ... but why does the D. A. care so much anyway? We follow Mark on the trail from South Boston ("Southie") to Cape Cod, where his mother lives, and the site of his childhood memories of his father. The pictures lead him to the truth about his dad that his mother couldn't tell him, as she didn't know, and a final showdown with some desperate goons.
  
  Closest I can come to the style would be an American Murakami; the narcolepsy can leave Mark at times unsure of what's real and what's a dream, making him an involuntary unreliable narrator. I found his patter hilarious, but it's not for everyone; if you find it grating early on: bail! For folks who've read Lethem's
  Motherless Brooklyn, Mark reminded me a lot of Lionel.
  
  Fifth star is for the outstanding audio narration -- one of those cases where I could swear the book was written specifically for Stephen Thorne to read it! Only quibble there is that I found his Boston accent for Mark's mother a bit weak; he needed to drop it, or have made it thicker.
  
  To my Goodreads friends: try it! If the book's not for you, however, I can understand why.
• 
  bookswithpaulette

  Enjoyable read, reminds me of dick tracey like a 50's detective comic. I liked it , a bit quirky
• 
  Wayne Fenlon

  I bought this book on a whim when I saw SST had a special signed edition coming out.
  Man, I'm so glad I did. I absolutely loved this. This one felt just so damn cool from the get go. What a great character with a terrific, original voice. I blazed through this.
  Five stars no question.
• 
  Caleb Ross

  Click the image below to watch the quick Wordless Video Book Review
  
  
  
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• 
  Stephanie Griffin

  Paul Tremblay’s first novel, THE LITTLE SLEEP, was just what I needed! A case being investigated by a funny P.I. with narcolepsy! Having previously read and enjoyed his A HEAD FULL OF GHOSTS, I was pretty sure I would like this book as well.
  Mark Genevich is a South Boston P.I. Between fits of sleep and cataplexy he has to deduce what really has happened and what has not, being only in his imagination. When someone comes into his office, wanting to hire him and leaving behind two old pictures, Mark is in the dark about who it was and what they want him to find.
  Mark’s father died when Mark was five and he doesn’t have a particularly close relationship with his mother. When he finds out that his father may have been involved with the event in the pictures, he doubles down on his secrecy from her.
  He also runs into a talent show reject, a couple of goons that he can’t shake, and a corrupt D.A. His interactions with one town’s lone cabbie, Brill, are great.
  I appreciated the self-deprecating humor very much. When you’re low, sometimes that’s all you’ve got to keep yourself going!
  THE LITTLE SLEEP is sort of a send-up of THE BIG SLEEP by Raymond Chandler, but here the P.I. is the exact opposite of Philip Marlowe. He’s broken down and unsure but he does try to stay on track.
  Tremblay’s story is fun but also has a suspenseful climax.
  I highly recommend this book! Now I’m on to the second story about Mark Genevich, P.I.: NO SLEEP TILL WONDERLAND!
• 
  Brandon

  After a traumatic accident some years ago, Mark Genevich is left with a brain injury that resulted in narcolepsy. While a more than inconvenient health problem, it’s made worse given his choice to become a private investigator. We pick up when Mark is approached by a Jennifer Times, the daughter of a prominent Massachusetts District Attorney, with a request to identify who stole her fingertips.
  
  Sometime later, Mark awakens to find an envelope containing photos of Jennifer in, shall we say, compromising positions. Given Mark’s inability to often separate reality from a waking dream, he isn’t quite sure what to believe when it comes to Jennifer’s initial request nor the photos. Did she drop them off? Or did someone visit him during his slumber?
  
  Or was Jennifer ever there at all?
  
  I thought this was a pretty inventive idea for a P.I. We’ve often seen unreliable narrators in the past, but rarely have we seen one who isn’t sure what’s real and what’s a hallucination. Because of Mark’s narcolepsy, he exists in a dream-like state where the edges of reality are often blurred. He does his best with what he’s given and because of his dismal outlook on life, he’s equipped with loads of snark. This all mixes together to create an entertaining, albeit sometimes frustrating experience.
  
  If the title wasn’t a dead giveaway, author Paul Tremblay looked to Raymond Chandler’s iconic character Philip Marlowe for inspiration. Tremblay’s style takes a lot from Chandler with short, staccato sentences that are both blunt in execution and rife with simile. It’s a bold move because Chandler is a tough writer to try and imitate. The few that tried to continue on with Chandler’s Marlowe series certainly couldn’t do it and I’m not sure Tremblay can either (although, I’m not sure if that was his true intention). Then again, Chandler is my absolute favorite writer, so I may be biased.
  
  There’s enough here to this character for me to want to pick up the next book in the series (and to date, the only other novel featuring Mark Genevich). Tremblay seems to have moved primarily into horror, but The Little Sleep proves he definitely can write within the mystery genre. I look forward to checking out his other spookier work.
• 
  Max Soucie

  Tremblay’s books are always winners for me. This was a sharp, quick, intriguing piece of detective fiction with a punchy writing style that had me hooked from the first page. Not my usual genre of preference, but still enjoyable.
  
  3.5 stars rounded up to 4!
• 
  Hobart

  Paul Tremblay's debut novel, The Little Sleep, not only sports a eye-catching title, but a premise that's just as intriguing.
  
  Obviously, the title's supposed to get the reader thinking of noir classic, The Big Sleep by Raymond Chandler--so one expects the lone-wolf, tougher than nails, sardonically witty gumshoe typified by Philip Marlowe. But Tremblay's protagonist, Mark Genevich, has one challenge his predecessors in the genre doesn't have...he's a narcoleptic. So he's falling asleep, hallucinating and losing control of his body and the most inconvenient times (for Genevich, anyway...the occasionally seem a convenient deus ex machina to get Tremblay out of a scene).
  
  Initially, the book didn't do much for me--had a hard time caring for Genevich or his problem, his client, and the early chapters seemed a little too erratic. But I hung in there, and eventually, Genevich explains his disorder enough that you can accept the bouncing-around nature of the first chapters. I'm still not sure how sympathetic Tremblay ever makes him, but you do at least start to want him to figure out what's going on--which is close enough.
  
  I remember when I started working the graveyard shift (I guess 3rd shift is the term we're supposed to use now), I had a lot of days where I couldn't be sure that I wouldn't fall asleep w/o warning--in a theater, during a slow after-dinner conversation, on the road(!)--and I recognized the embarrassment, anger and confusion Genevich displayed. No matter what precautions he took, the very real danger of waking in a different place or his body not acting like he intended always loomed large. I'm assuming Tremblay has no first-hand knowledge of the disorder, but he sure acts like he does.
  
  Genevich's path to solving this particular case follows many of the typical hardboiled paths, but he cannot travel those paths like his forefathers because of his disorder. Unlike with Monk, Genvich's problem is never fodder for humor--unlike Monk's OCD, which would've been very easy, and probably very entertaining. Tremblay sticks to the high road, however, resulting in a deeper, probably more satisfying, read.
• 
  Sean Owen

  Why does every writer with noir aspirations drag out the same tired formula. The powerful politican with a dark past calls on the help of a small town private eye with "insert quirky trait/disability/illness here" to help with a case involving his daughter. This cliched framework alone doesn't doom a book to failure. The problem lies more in these writers believing that the quirky trait they've given the detective is enough to carry the book.
  
  Tremblay's detective is a narcoleptic. This illness creates the confusion that in the opening chapters propels the book forward. Later the illness sort of recedes to the background and only pops up when needed to drive the story forward. It's sort of an original insight, but it's not fully realized as anything other than a convenient device.
  
  The rest of the book is totally straight forward and paint by numbers. The detective is after the truth for the sake of the truth alone. He pursues the truth without worrying about himself. The bad guys have all the power and will get away with everything if the detective doesn't stop them. While the detective is being beaten and pursued he always has time for a self-deprecating one liner.
  
  Within the first 15 pages it was pretty clear where the book was going. I should have listened and put the book down.
• 
  Michael X

  I thoroughly enjoyed this book and look forward to reading the sequel in the not too distant future. The little sleep grabbed me from page one - I only meant to have a sneak look - and ended up abandoning my other "books-on-the-go" until I'd snapped the back cover shut.
• 
  Tracy

  Maybe a three and a half. I'm not sure if the narcolepsy confuses the story. I wasn't quite sure after the first 100 pages, since it wasn't that long, I finished it. Once everything started to show a little cohesion, it was better
• 
  Jake

  It’s clear that I need to read more of Paul Tremblay’s work. While I didn’t love The Pallbearer’s Club, I enjoyed Tremblay’s writing style. He came across as accessible and fun, someone I could easily digest while providing enough pathos for his protagonists to feel like they are more than literary ciphers.
  
  I grabbed this on a lark in a bookstore, knowing that it was an early Tremblay novel and a satire of the hardboiled PI genre. As I’ve written about before, I’m not a fan of most satire as I’m too literal minded. But as I said, I liked Tremblay’s writing so I tried it.
  
  Perhaps this is satirical on one level but Tremblay’s humor is muted. There is a touch of it but mostly, one feels for the stumbling, bumbling narcoleptic Mark Genevich. Much like Lionel Essrog in Motherless Brooklyn, Genevich’s debilitating condition seems like hell and he has to struggle through it in order to solve a rather intricate political mystery involving a Boston DA with connections to none other than Whitey Bulger, and his daughter, who happens to be a star on an American Idol type show.
  
  There’s a surrealist aspect as neither the reader nor Mark knows what’s real and what’s hallucinatory but Tremblay is able to steady the narrative because he knows how to ape Chandler in the best ways. There are similes but they don’t go over-the-top. There’s tough guy dialogue but it’s always spoken through the mouth of a true sad sack. It’s quite a tribute to Chandler, better than most, and the narcolepsy bit feels less like a gimmick (which I assumed it was) and more like the centrifuge that spins the story.
  
  One of my favorite crime tales this year, I’m fast becoming a fan of Tremblay’s work.
  
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  Dean

  The Little sleep was an entertaining read with an interesting story. Narcoleptic Private eye (and indeed you do learn a lot about this medical malady while reading this.) Mark Genevich is on the case and between bouts of passing out and having a very unreliable narrative because of hallucination manages to find the bad guys. Kind of Raymond Chandler meets the Rockford Files meets Jay and Silent Bob meets Memento.
  There were times when I wanted to choke the life out of the protagonist because he became irritating. If you can get past that, it's an ok read.
  I do feel like Tremblay is a good writer and my lack of love for this would not make me hesitate to read his work again, I just don't believe that I would be able to read a sequel.
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  Jennifer

  Sorry. Not it for me. I love Paul Tremblay’s supernatural/horror stuff. A couple are among my favorite books ever ever. I feel bad shitting all over this book, but I did NOT dig it.
  
  This was the first book he wrote (just republished) and it’s entirely different. A private detective story with the schtick being that he has narcolepsy. Aside from that, not interesting at all. Woof - I definitely realized before the halfway mark that this was not for me. Skimmed whole pages and still got the gist. Boring. Sorry.
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  Amy

  A solid 4 stars. I’m a big noir murder mystery fan, love all the old black and whites as well as the novels. Phillip Marlow and The Big Sleep is one of my favorites and I enjoyed the way Paul Tremblay had a Phillip Marlow-esque character with narcolepsy who has a lot of little sleeps. Funny!
  
  The character makes real mistakes and has so many great one-liners and come backs. One of my favorites was when he was being cornered by two goons. He said “I’ll be the meat in this goon sandwich”. Ha!
  
  I listened to this on audiobook and the narrator did a fantastic job playing the gritty hardboiled detective. Looking forward to more cases to solve with Mark Genevich.
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  Ben Stoffel

  Really great detective novel, the ending was a little unsatisfying and that’s what hinders it from a true 5⭐️ but the depiction of the Massachusetts settings and books and crannies of every place Genevich went to was incredible. Witty but not to the point of overdoing it or exhaustion, and a very good detective, I like the narcolepsy twist that was great and original