The Sleep Room - Softcover

F. R. Tallis

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1447204999 ISBN 13: 9781447204992

Publisher: Pan Books, 2013

Synopsis

When promising young psychiatrist James Richardson is offered the job opportunity of a lifetime by the charismatic Dr. Hugh Maitland, he is thrilled. Setting off to take up his post at Wyldehope Hall in deepest Suffolk, Richardson doesn't look back. One of his tasks is to manage Maitland's most controversial project--a pioneering therapy in which extremely disturbed patients are kept asleep for months. If this radical and potentially dangerous procedure is successful, it could mean professional glory for both doctors.

As Richardson settles into his new life, he begins to sense something uncanny about the sleeping patients--six women, forsaken by society. Why is Maitland unwilling to discuss their past lives? Why is the trainee nurse so on edge when she spends nights alone with them? And what can it mean when all the sleepers start dreaming at the same time? In this atmospheric reinvention of the ghost story, Richardson finds himself questioning everything he knows about the human mind, as he attempts to uncover the shocking secrets of The Sleep Room . . .

About this title

About the Author

F. R. Tallis is a writer and clinical psychologist. Between 1999 and 2012, he received or was nominated for numerous awards, including the New London Writers’ Award, the Ellis Peters Historical Dagger, the Elle Prix de Letrice, the Crime Writers’ Association Historical Dagger Award, and two Edgar Allan Poe Awards. He is the author of The Sleep Room, The Forbidden, The Voices, and The Passenger, all available from Pegasus Crime. He lives in London.

From Booklist

For psychiatrist James Richardson, working for the renowned Dr. Hugh Maitland at Wyldehope Hall in Suffolk in the 1950s is a rare professional opportunity that is bound to enhance his future prospects. But his sense of foreboding begins to grow in the remote setting, particularly surrounding the sleep room, Maitland’s controversial project in which six severely mentally ill women are treated by being kept asleep for months on end. As Richardson adjusts to his duties and establishes a romantic relationship with nurse Jane Turner, unexplained events, seemingly caused by a poltergeist, puzzle him and frighten a staff member and male patient, with disastrous consequences. At the same time, he observes that the dreams of the sleeping women are becoming synchronized, a situation that ultimately leads to tragedy. Clinical-psychologist Tallis, author of the Max Liebermann mysteries set in Freud’s Vienna (written under the name of Frank Tallis), explores the mysteries of the human mind and the nature of reality so skillfully that his final twist can be easily accepted in this novel of psychological suspense that’s firmly grounded in fact. --Michele Leber

Edition details

• Publisher: Pan Books
• Publication date: 2013
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1447204999
• ISBN 13: 9781447204992
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 400