Sleepwalk by Dan Chaon: Summary and Study Guide
⚠️ Spoiler Warning: This guide contains detailed spoilers for the entire novel. Proceed only if you've finished reading or are comfortable knowing the plot.
Quick Facts
| Field | Detail |
|---|---|
| Author | Dan Chaon |
| Publication year | 2022 |
| Genre | Near-future thriller |
| Setting | Near-future United States |
| Narrator | First-person |
| Protagonist | Will Bear (also known by many aliases) |
Short Summary
Will Bear is a courier who transports illicit goods across a decaying near-future America, using dozens of aliases and burner phones to stay untraceable. His life is disrupted when Cammie, a young woman claiming to be his biological daughter from a sperm donation he made decades earlier, contacts him. She claims he has 167 biological children and that a conspiracy surrounds them. His employer Tim Ribbons orders him to kill her. As Will investigates, he uncovers betrayals from his childhood friend Experanza, learns about a eugenic breeding program, and ultimately chooses to protect Cammie rather than kill her, escaping to a tropical island with her and two other women he calls his daughters.
Full Summary
A Courier's Life
The novel opens with Will Bear, a courier who transports illicit goods across a decaying near-future United States. He operates under dozens of aliases—Will Bear, William Baird, Bill Behr, Willard Baier, and many more—each tied to a different burner phone. He lives in a custom motor home called the Guiding Star with his rescued pitbull mix, Flip, a former fighting dog with scars and shotgun BBs from his past.
Will's work involves transporting people and goods for a shadowy network. Early in the novel, he drives a shackled young man named Liandro across Utah, delivers an infant in a cardboard box labeled