Answers To Go with Susan Smith

Q. I just finished “The Second Sleep,” a novel by Robert Harris. In the foreword, he mentions the source for his title. I’d like to get that book.

A. Novelist, our subscription database on all types of literature, offers this information on the writer: “British novelist Robert Harris writes gripping, fast-paced historical fiction and political thrillers.

“Whether set in ancient Rome or an alternative version of postwar Germany. Harris' suspenseful historical fiction is driven by elaborate mysteries, political conspiracies and chilling violence involving vivid, well-developed portraits of famous historical figures.

“In his intricately plotted political thrillers, Harris crafts addictive pageturners that apply this same flair for suspenseful intrigue to modern polities, espionage and cybercrime.”

“Second Sleep,” introduces the reader to a young priest who, after the suspicious death of an older clergyman, travels to what appears to be a remote mid-15th century English village.

Things are not as they first appear, but we will focus on the reader's original question. He wanted to read a book cited in the foreword: “At Day’s Close: Night in Times Past” by A. Roger Ekirch.

Here is the relevant passage: “Until the close of the early modern era, Westem Europeans on most evenings experienced two major intervals of sleep... The initial interval of slumber was usually referred to as 'first sleep.'"

“The succeeding interval was called ‘second’ or ‘morning’ sleep... Both phases lasted roughly the same length of time, with individuals waking sometime after midnight before returning to rest.”

Our reader said that in the novel, people would routinely rise in the middle of the night and work for awhile before going back to bed.