Book Summary
Justin opens an all-night café but is soon on a quest to find out how his insomnia is connected to the murder of a customer.
Café Insomniac is a hypnotic journey through the fantastical life of a chronic insomniac.
Twenty-five-year-old
insomniac Justin Brooks opens an all-night café for something to do, to fill
the long nights. But soon after the opening, one of his customers is murdered. The
fallout from the murder makes his insomnia worse -- much worse. He completely
loses the ability to sleep.
Strange things start to
happen in Justin's world, things that are hard to explain.
His eyes stream when it rains
outside..... Another café appears, out of the fog, out of nowhere.....
Footsteps follow him everywhere..... The dead person talks to him, though it's
not a ghost..... And a magician waits for him, perched on a high wire, high up
in the night sky.....
Strange things indeed. But each strange thing is a clue to the mystery and will
open a world that will shock Justin to the core.
"I don't know what's
real and what isn't -- and which is most dangerous."
Candy Girl's Review
If you ever watched videos of Mulholland Drive
On the surface it is a straight forward mystery-thriller, a
crime noir romance maybe, with some surrealism thrown in for good measure
with a dark, unsettling atmosphere hanging around in the air.
A murder taking place just some side streets away from where
Café Insomniac is located sets a whole set of rather nervous action in motion.
The novel is (almost) movielike, and indeed, has this
Lynchesque feeling, full with red herrings, mixed identities (<--- this
could be another red herring, so be cautious what you believe) and many hints
and clues throughout the book. Easily overlooked since those hints are so
cleverly integrated into the storyline and plot itself. It is fun to go back to
see where the narrative took a turn, where those clues are mixed up with the
"reality" of the here and now of the book itself.
Justin, in this first person narrative, is hardly the
reliable narrator per definition, since insomnia and self-diagnosis about
hallucinations leads to some rather odd ideas about what is happening, or what
is supposed to be happening. The whole scenery is visceral, and partly
"magical realistic", even the surrealistic imagery is used sparingly
but nevertheless vital to the narration.
The insomnia undoubtly affects Justin's daily life in several
ways. As an ex-teacher is not really cut out to be a small business owner, a
dreamer who gives away his coffee for free to the homeless, or lets his
customers for hours stay quietly in his café. He is charming, but also naïve.
His father, as an investor and partner into the café, is however a different
chapter altogether. The family dynamics is strong, and so are the secrets which
are one by one revealed.
A cast of rather absurd characters (real life vampires!),
absurd in the sense that those are hardly the people one meets normally, but
are original in their whole appearance and yes, characteristics, makes the book
a joy. Each of those "play" their different roles accordingly.
Spinner, the homeless ex-politician, is the most remarkable
of those, and a pleasure to read about him. I also enjoyed "his"
band, The Bedless, a lot. It is just good clean fun to "watch" their performances
of well-known songs like All Along The Watchtower or Where The Wild Roses
Grow.
However the music and pop references are cool and show some
great taste in music but are overused, and to much off a show-off to be really
enjoyable after a while.
The only real problem I have with this book is with one
chapter where a character is totally overblown and hardly believable to be the
18yo old girl she is supposed to be. I can see how the author, Mark Capell, has
done a lot of research into insomnia and here this one character is simply used
as a counterpart to set some misunderstandings about insomnia and sleep
deprivation straight. It’s a back and forth of information, but the way the
chapter is used is too obvious to be a mouthpiece for the author himself.
The prose is easy on the eye, it reads fluently while being
down-to-earth. It is good old fashioned storytelling and done with care even
everything seems to be - deliberately - off-balance, unsettling even.
(Legal disclaimer: I received a free copy of Café Insomniac
via a BookLikes giveaway from the author, Mark Capell. Thank you!)
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