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While You Sleep cover art

While You Sleep

By: Stephanie Merritt
Narrated by: Caitlin Thorburn
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Summary

A pacy, chilling psychological thriller, set to reinvent the genre. 

It begins, they say, with a woman screaming.... 

On a remote Scottish island, the McBride house stands guard over its secrets. A century ago, a young widow and her son died mysteriously there; just last year a local boy, visiting for a dare, disappeared without a trace. 

For Zoe Adams, newly arrived from America, the house offers a refuge from her failing marriage. But her peaceful retreat is disrupted by strange and disturbing events: nighttime intrusions; unknown voices; a constant sense of being watched. 

The locals want her to believe that these incidents are echoes of the McBrides' dark past. Zoe is convinced the danger is closer at hand and all too real - but can she uncover the truth before she is silenced? 

©2018 Stephanie Merritt (P)2018 HarperCollins Publishers Limited

Critic reviews

"Creepy, clever, atmospheric, a fabulous Gothic thriller." (Kate Mosse)
"Pure edge-of-the-seat stuff: a fantastically entertaining, yet deeply unsettling read." (Julie Myerson)

"Forget sleep - this broodingly creepy gothic tale of love, lust and loss on a remote Scottish island kept me awake most of the night, partly from fear, but mostly because I couldn't put it down." (Fiona Neill, best-selling author of The Betrayals)

What listeners say about While You Sleep

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  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars
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    3 out of 5 stars

My ears are bleeding!

A reasonable story but oh my god the narration!!! This narrator has single handed affronted the entire Scottish nation with her attempts at a Scottish accent. She sounds like Frank Carson with throat cancer having a stroke!! Totally spoilt what is otherwise a reasonably good story. I dreaded the parts where I knew she was about to murder the accent again like one would anticipate nails being scraped down a blackboard. Story would transfer well to screen so long as they use ACTUAL Scottish actors and would be good in paper/kindle format.

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  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars
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    4 out of 5 stars

While you sleep by Stephanie Merritt

This was a creepy paranormal thriller, which had it all. Ghosts, evil, dead children, younger lover, bad men, winds, storms, thunder, lightning.
It was a really good book to listen too and an enjoyable read.

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2 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars
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    3 out of 5 stars
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    2 out of 5 stars

Story with no depth

Really not impressed with this audio book. So many loose ends that are meant to create a mysterious atmosphere, but really just led to annoyance in my case. Performance was fine.

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  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars
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    4 out of 5 stars

Dodgy Scottish Accents

Terrible “Scottish” accents. The Scottish characters did not sound Scottish and the Islanders seemed to speak in a raspy whisper that was very annoying. The narrator’s speaking voice and American accents were lovely- just a dire attempt at sounding Scottish. The Story however, held my interest until the end.

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2 people found this helpful

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    3 out of 5 stars
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    3 out of 5 stars

So-so.

I enjoyed this book on the whole but there was something a little disappointing about the storyline and its conclusion. I think I also got rather fed up with Zoe's constant irritation with pretty much every person who tried to help her.

The accents were also pretty dreadful at the start although they did improve.

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  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars
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    2 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

Accents!

Please, for the love of your listeners, stop trying to put on accents that you aren't familiar with. Listening to someone mutilate the story line with a gross approximation really spoils things.

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3 people found this helpful

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    3 out of 5 stars
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Dreadful accents put me off this ghost story

Since the story takes place in Scotland it might have been sensible to get a narrator who could manage the accents. Male characters sound particularly odd - even the English ones. It has put me off finishing the book even though I’m enjoying the story.

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2 people found this helpful

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    3 out of 5 stars
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    3 out of 5 stars
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    3 out of 5 stars

Ok

Story was ok but spoiled somewhat by the narration. Misplaced emphasis and pauses made it more difficult to listen to. Ending rather predictable.

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  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

Brilliant

This audio was riving. well written, well read. superb story that you just have to keep on listening to. Highly recomended.

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3 people found this helpful

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    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

Really enjoyed this&the narration is BRILLIANT!

This is totally my kind of book in every way, brilliantly atmospheric and creepy. Yes the Scottish accent isn’t the greatest (i am also Scottish) but the whole book is not just that character so the negative reviews are not justified because the narration of every single other character was WONDERFUL!💯👏🏽
Caitlin (the narrator) has a beautiful voice and read this book exactly as it should have been read! She done her very best and tried obviously VERY hard to do the Scottish accent which isn’t easy to do, and after a while I actually didn’t mind it whatsoever and grew to like it! It certainly wasn’t a problem or was I giving up on the brilliant story because of 1 characters voice! Thoroughly enjoyed this in every way! Brilliant book and BRILLIANT narration! Well done Caitlin! Thank you audible for another AMAZING book!💯💯💯💯👏🏽👏🏽👏🏽👏🏽♥️xxx

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1 person found this helpful