Night Terrors: Troubled Sleep and the Stories We Tell About It

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Icon Books is an independent publisher of thought-provoking non-fiction. We publish science, history, politics, philosophy, psychology, humour and much else besides

We are mysterious creatures, to others and ourselves. How to explain the creative brainstorms, harebrained schemes, and shudder-causing evil thoughts that suddenly appear in our normally quite sane brains? Why did evolution provide us with consciousness? And, pray tell, WTF are dreams? Senior commissioning editor Kiera Jamison bought world English rights for both books from Donald Winchester. Icon will publish both titles in autumn 2022.

This week, we’re here with Alice Vernon, a woman long fascinated by what happens to our brains during sleep. Taking that interest one step further led Alice to begin research for her new book, Night Terrors, and that deep dive uncovered centuries worth of literature and analysis, some of it mind boggling.

All in all, I think this book did exactly what it sought out to do - offer the reassurance that we are not alone. If you're interested in the darkers parts of our sleep, I would highly recommend this book. Night Terrors aims to shine a light on the darkest parts of our sleeping lives, and to reassure sufferers from bad dreams that they are not alone. IN HEADSPACE: HOW THE SEVENTIES LOST ITS MIND, FOUND ITSELF AND TAUGHT US TO BE WELL, by Dr James Riley, tells the story of the New Age Health movements of the 1970s, and how they formed the basis for today’s contemporary wellness industry. From coastal meditation retreats to the paranoias of darkened flotation tanks, he tells the often-bizarre tale of what happened when the psychedelic generation met the psychiatric profession. Riley’s previous book, THE BAD TRIP: DARK OMENS, NEW WORLDS AND THE END OF THE SIXTIES , was published by Icon in 2018 . Apart from interesting discussions about various parasomnias, Alice has a variety of annecdotes that range from hilarious, creepy, and even some that actually made me cry.The reader’s journey starts with the very first parasomnia that Vernon experienced as a child: sleepwalking. We then move on to hypnopompic hallucinations – primarily visual hallucinations that manifest moments after waking up; think spiders scuttling on your pillow. Later on, we explore sleep paralysis, night terrors and, finally, dreams and nightmares.