Ann
asked
Chris Bohjalian:
I was intrigued by the extensive background on sleep disorders in "The Sleepwalker". As I was reading, I got the impression that you became interested in it because parasomnias are one of the mechanisms by which people end up behaving against their volition - and so you end up with tremendous potential for conflict, as you showed in the Ahlberg's marriage. What made you become interested in that? Thank you.
Chris Bohjalian
Originally, I thought I was going to write a book about dreams, that great Freudian abyss. But I had lunch early in my research with a physician at a hospital sleep center, and he had just come from seeing a patient who was a sleepwalker. And so our conversation rather naturally gravitated there. He started to tell me stories of people who sleep cook, sleep drive, sleep jog, and sleep sex -- and I grew interested. When I came across a study of sleep crime, I was hooked. I knew that sleepwalking, not dreams, was what I wanted to write about. Thanks for asking!
More Answered Questions
Mark
asked
Chris Bohjalian:
I enjoy your work and I am always amazed at the quality of writing, story telling and research. I'm also amazed at the rapidity of releases. How do you conduct your research? Do you have a team collecting the information? Or, with access to unlimited on the internet, do you collect your own research? Thanks, and continued success.
Linda
asked
Chris Bohjalian:
Why didn't we ask our grandparents before it was too late? My grandparents who escaped the death march never talked about it. The horrors were too vivid. Years after my grandfather died, I found out that he & all the villagers were locked in a church and the Turks burned it down. He was the only one who escaped. My Grandmother had 1 family portrait, how did she keep that on the death march? Why didn't we ask?
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