Book Review #8
Yeama reads 'Der längste Schlaf'

© Josiane A.-H.
Dreams are poetry, taking liberties with reality. And why shouldn’t they? But what happens when the borders between dream and reality blur and rob us of our sleep? Over the course of its 352 pages, Melanie Raabe’s novel Der längste Schlaf reveals the world of German-born, London-based sleep scientist Mara Lux. Lux takes a radical new approach to her research, while paradoxically suffering from insomnia herself. As readers, we are confronted with her condition from the novel’s onset, becoming acquainted page by page with its peculiarities.

Mara’s parents died young; she is rarely in Germany. And so, she is surprised to receive a message one day from a notary in Frankfurt: An anonymous benefactor would like to bequeath her a sprawling manor house in the German countryside. Mara thinks this must be a mistake, but she travels there anyway, curious to experience an unfamiliar provincial city and all it has to offer. She is shocked by the discovery that she already has a strange connection to the place through her dreams. I was immediately fascinated by the novel’s shifts between different narrative frameworks and embedded stories, flashbacks and dialogues negotiating strange happenstance, though I occasionally found myself faltering, as well. The text moved me along quickly as a reader through both its approachable language and the fast-paced tempo of the plot. Surreal moments made frequent appearances, marking the way in which sleep and dreams have written themselves formally into the text. I was grabbed by this thriller’s arc of suspense, its innovative engagement with questions such as: What is sleep? What lies behind insomnia? And just what are our dreams? Questions with so very much behind them that some passages left me brooding in their wake.

Der längste Schlaf comes out on 18 September 2024 with Btb.