Stay Awake

“Eerily beautiful . . . [Chaon] is the modern day John Cheever.”— Boston Sunday Globe

“Powerful and disturbing . . . The shocks in this collection are many.”—The Washington Post

“Chaon is able to create fully realized characters in mere pages. . . . This collection is further proof that Chaon is one of the best fiction writers working right now.”—Omaha World-Herald

“There are not many fiction writers who can do what Dan Chaon can do. . . . [He is] a literary force.”—The Philadelphia Inquirer

“Intense and suspenseful . . . a highly recommended work, not to be missed.”—Library Journal (starred review)

“Mesmerizing . . . gripping, masterful fiction.”—The Plain Dealer

“Superbly disquieting.”—The New York Times Book Review

“[Chaon] is a master of psychological tension. . . . These stories demand and capture your attention, and they don’t let go even after you’ve finished reading them.”—The Miami Herald

“An understated master of the form . . . Chaon has returned to the format with more quietly haunting stories of isolation and disconnection that stick with you like faded images from a disturbing dream.”—Los Angeles Times

“[Chaon’s] command of language, and his empathy with his characters, leave you not shaking your head in disbelief, but simply, gratifyingly, shaken.”—The Wall Street Journal

“If Chaon’s 2001 [book] Among the Missing, which was nominated for a National Book Award, contained some of the best fiction written in the past twenty years, Stay Awake is its darker, more unsettling cousin.”—Esquire

“The remarkable variety and depth within the limits Chaon has set makes Stay Awake an irresistible collection for those who don’t mind risking a few nightmares of their own.”—The Columbus Dispatch

“Stay Awake is a profound collection of contemporary ghost stories in the tradition of M. R. James and Peter Straub’s Houses Without Doors. The prose unveils an atmospheric menace animated by a grief grounded in the real world.”—The Houston Chronicle

“Moving . . . Dan Chaon deliver[s] some of the best of what contemporary short fiction has to offer.”—BookPage

“Chaon has a knack for the dramatic . . . but there’s more than a beguiling premise animating these stories. His real quarry is the pervasive nature of trauma’s aftermath.”—Time Out New York

“Grounded in realism but leading to some fantastic places, Chaon’s stories keep the reader guessing as they blur the lines between dreams and waking nightmares.”—The Dallas Morning News