Reviewed by Craig Sisterson
It's rare for a young woman to die from a stroke and when three such deaths occur in short order it starts to look like an epidemic. Then a sharp pathologist notices traces of benzodiazepine in one of the victim's blood samples and just traceable damage to the ligaments in her neck, and their cause of death is changed from 'natural' to murder. The police aren't making much progress in their hunt for the killer until he appears to make a mistake: Alison Willetts is found alive and D.I. Tom Thorne believes the murderer has made a mistake, which ought to allow them to get on his tracks.
But it was the others who were his mistakes: he doesn't want to take life, he just wants to put people into a state where they cannot move, cannot talk, cannot do anything but think. When Thorne, helped by the neurologist looking after Alison, starts to realise what he is up against he knows the case is not going to be solved by normal methods - before he can find out who did it he has to understand why he's doing it.
Twenty years ago an exciting new voice hit the British crime writing scene with a superb, dark and twisted debut. I stumbled across the book from a then new-to-me author - who would go on to become an all-time fave - in Auckland a couple of years later. (Incidentally that was a very good book buying day - I nabbed THE POET by Michael Connelly, PURPLE CANE ROAD by James Lee Burke, and SLEEPYHEAD by Mark Billingham all on the same day; my first reads of three magnificent authors).
Almost two decades and many, many hundreds of crime novels read later (including twelve years of reviewing for various publications and judging several literary awards), I'd still throw SLEEPYHEAD into the mix for any discussion of the very best starts to a long-running crime series I can remember reading.
Comedian turned author Mark Billingham introduced himself to the crime scene with a heck of a tale that blended dark storylines with an engaging main character, nice touches of gallows humour and character interplay, and a fresh spin on what had gone before. Given that Billingham has become an absolute stalwart of the British crime writing scene over the years since - a modern great, really - it may be easy to overlook just how startling his debut was at the time.
While there were familiar elements for fans of police procedurals and serial killer tales, Billingham also brought something fresh, both through his personal mix of elements and the hook to his debut storyline: the villain wasn't aiming to kill his victims; instead something that was even more chilling. SLEEPYHEAD is a goosebumps in the dark, restless sleep kind of read. A chiller more than a thriller.
The hook (which may have caught the eye of American TV creators, if the first-ever episode of CSI: New York a few years later is anything to go by) and the well-crafted, twisting plotline would have alone been enough to get Billingham deserved notice.
But SLEEPYHEAD also layers in some wonderful crime characters that have degrees of depth explored in ways big and small in this debut, and in several cases later throughout following books in the series. While country music loving DI Tom Thorne is at the heart of things, there's also a fascinating team around him - with heavily tattooed and pierced pathologist Phil Hendricks a scene-stealing standout, as a character and for his role in the twisting storyline. Billingham also lets readers get the perspective of the victim of the crime, Alison - unusual and welcome, and done with a good touch.
There's some complexity and nuance to SLEEPYHEAD, while it also grips you tight from the beginning then flows really well as the pages melt by. It's neither stodgy nor thin; instead finely balanced and very satisfying. A very, very good read from a very, very good author.
Craig Sisterson is a lawyer turned features writer from New Zealand, now living in London. He has been a judge of the Ned Kelly Awards and the McIlvanney Prize, and is founder of the Ngaio Marsh Awards and co-founder of Rotorua Noir. His first non-fiction book, SOUTHERN CROSS CRIME, was published in 2020. You can heckle him on Twitter.
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