"Sleep Alone" Book Review

Ronnie is a merch girl for a band that’s always on tour. She’s an enigmatic woman who keeps to herself with one rule: no matter where she is, she always sleeps alone. The band is her family, such as it is, but she refuses to allow anyone to get too close. Ronnie is also a succubus, born and raised, who consumes energy and emotion. The band has been turned into beings much like her, traveling and feeding as they go.

Then Ronnie meets Helene, a beautiful and mysterious loner. Sparks fly between them immediately and Helen has her share of secrets and passions. Unfortunately, a disease begins to eat at the band and the new dynamic Helen represents drives a wedge between them. Ronnie no longer “belongs” to the boys, and some of them don’t handle it altogether well.

J.A.W. McCarthy’s Sleep Alone is a fine and fantastic example of how flexible horror fiction can be. “Rock And Roll Succubus” is a premise that lends itself to exploration. McCarthy wastes no time plunging us into a world of cigarette smoke, alcohol, cheap sex, and runaway secrets.

Ronnie is, putting it mildly, not the best person. She is selfish, dangerous, occasionally callous and manipulative. She is also an absolutely fantastic character. Volatile, sympathetic, torn between her emotions for her makeshift family and her growing feelings for Helene. McCarthy writes these characters brilliantly.

It wouldn’t be a J.A.W. McCarthy story without tragedy. Sleep Alone will tug at the heartstrings from the start to the positively lachrymal conclusion. It’s a story that simply demands exploration, from the first opening note to the beautiful closing act.