Deprivation

Written by Roy Freirich

Narrated by T. Ryder Smith

A gripping psychological thriller from the author of Winged Creatures.

August, Carratuck Island, New York: a silent child is found abandoned on the beach clutching a handheld video
game, and residents and tourists alike find themselves stricken by relentless insomnia. Denied the outlet of dreams—
fears, guilt, and primal urges find other ways to surface. A teenage girl competes in an online game: who can stay awake
longest? The bleary police chief struggles to keep order. The local doctor battles the ghosts of his past to find the cause
and a cure for the epidemic, and face down the violent mob that blames the child. Cut off from the mainland, the
island plunges into chaos, murder, and suicide.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Recorded Books, Inc.
• Release date: Mar 3, 2020
• ISBN: 9781980085416

Reviews for Deprivation

[T Green · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Great writing, and edge-of-your-seat thriller with wonderful characters. Perfect narrator for the book! Highly recommended.

[sondic_1 · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

The premise is a good one. The character development isn’t the best. The main character is okay and I like that the story is told from multiple perspectives but the motivations of people are thin and surface-like. Especially the female characters. It is told one day at a time. The symptoms of sleep deprivation don’t seem to affect most of the characters until day seven and eight which is just silly. I feel like the author should have tried it themselves before writing about it. There should have been more clumsy accidents on days two and three. More desperation more quickly. They describe people first as completely altruistic and then suddenly completely animalistic. Yes most people are pretty selfish and on the edge of insanity on any given day of the week. But there was no way to guess a characters’ next move because it was so haphazard. The last few chapters were action packed but I mad myself read the thing to find out WHY it was happening and in the end, major characters are killed off and no explanation is provided. I was really disappointed.

[chutchi-1 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

What an adventure. This author writes so eloquently. A small island where people suddenly cannot sleep. It reminded me of Needful Things by Stephen King, except there is no devil. People just slowly go crazy and have disillusions about others. It did take me awhile to read it, but it was completely worth it. Excellent for adults and teens. Also, would make a fantastic movie. :-)

[kmt01_1 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Who is the mysterious child, and is he responsible for the horror that has enveloped the town? No one really knows. When a child is found alone on the beach, unwilling or unable to speak or write, along with being dirty, a doctor resident of the town must decide what to do. When he receives word of this, the local doctor, Dr. Sam Carlson, calls the town chief of police to help him figure out what to do. The chief is reluctant to call Child Services and stick the child into the system, so he persuades the doctor to take the child home. The doctor reluctantly agrees, as he is grappling with his own problems: coping with a student, who was also a patient, who committed suicide. Still, this is a child in need…Soon thereafter, the whole island is unable to sleep, and the growing insomnia drives people to the doctor for help. They then decide the child is the root of the problem. However, there is not much help coming, and mob rule takes over before you know it. What can the doctor and chief do to save the child from the mobs—or can they even save the child?The story is told from three perspectives: the chief of police’s, the doctor’s, and that of a teenage tourist, which made the book interesting because, you got different perspectives about the whole thing. The descriptions of the town’s actions, its residents and of those involved were interesting and spot-on. I enjoyed reading, waiting anxiously to see what would happen next and how or if it would all turn out okay. I am pretty much an insomniac, so I also related well to the story in that respect. Sleep deprivation can and will do strange things to the human body and psyche, as the book demonstrates. The book did start a bit slow for me, but it picked up soon enough. The situation, though horrifying, was a bit far-fetched, to say the least, but not really beyond the realms of possibility. The whole plot was definitely different, and not like the plots of books I normally read. If you have difficulty sleeping, you may want to pass on this one, but you also may want to jump right in as I did to see how it goes and what happens. I received this to read and review from Library Thing.

[jnmegan · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Deprivation a new novel by Roy Frierich, describes an insomnia outbreak that occurs over the course of nine days on a small fictional island off the Atlantic coast. A trauma-stricken boy is found wandering the beach of Carratuck Island, where tourists and locals are busy starting their usual summer vacation rituals. Sam is the doctor in charge of the Urgent Care Center, and his typical caseload involves simple accidents and sun-related maladies. This perfectly suits the young physician who wishes to escape a past that includes the mysterious death of a patient in his care while he was still a practicing Psychiatrist. Most of his days are now spent on his boat, enjoying the temporary company of a local waitress and biking around greeting his fellow islanders. When the “Boy” is brought in, Sam enlists the Chief of Police to locate the parents so the child can be released from his care. Filthy, mute and obviously terrorized, the boy grips his hand-held game and gives no clues as to what has happened to reduce him to this state. The book introduces another storyline centering around Cort, the vacationing teen who was supposed to be employed as the boy’s babysitter. Instead, she has been spending her time hooking up with a local surfer, partying with friends and participating in a new social media game that involves pulling all-nighters. The Chief is a third main character, a man who feels solely responsible for keeping the peace but only on his own terms with minimal interference. Sam starts to notice that the people coming to his clinic are all suddenly complaining of the same malady- complete sleeplessness. As the situation continues unabated and some disturbing behavior emerges, Sam reaches out to the mainland for assistance. Is the insomnia due to a contagion of the viral, environmental variety or could it be caused by a mass-hysteria? Sam and the Chief struggle with their own physical limitations resulting from lack of rest as the island begins to devolve into chaos. Carratuck becomes a pressure-cooker of irrational beliefs and desperate acts, exposing the basic animal nature brought about when self-preservation becomes paramount. Freirich’s prose is a bit too elaborate and his phrasing and word choice are often repetitive—which can be distracting and irritating at times. Still, Deprivation does provide a unique perspective on how people react when unable to meet their basic needs and the resulting contagion of fear and paranoia. It is a timely book, published during a real pandemic that tests our own ability to cope with uncertainty and tested solidarity. Thanks to the author, Meerkat Press and LibraryThing for an advance copy of this book in exchange for an unbiased review.

[nooiniin · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

Might work for some readers, but did not for meI was intrigued by the blurb, so I asked for an ARC. Regrettably, the novel did not deliver for me: an inconclusive, disjointed narrative with 3 main characters, all of which remained strangely two-dimensional, pale and un-relatable. Add to this a vast supporting cast with way too many characters serving to confuse and, ultimately, frustrate the reader. Trying to keep track was exhaustive at first and, ultimately, pointless: Whenever a character is introduced with their full names and a brief summary of their previous lives, you know you never come across them again.The writing style was not horrible. There was a weird pov shift in the last chapter and some flashbacks which were hard to spot and added to the overall confusion, however, the greatest obstacle to enjoyment, for me, was the lack of internal logic. I get that a work of speculative fiction does not have to be realistic, however, I need a gripping story with relatable characters to get me over the first bumps and have willful suspension of disbelief set in. Sadly, there were too many details I just could not swallow, among which being the worst: no way would - small-town physician run a lot of expensive testing on a bunch of disgruntled vacationers just because they could not get to sleep- small-town sheriff have allowed an abandoned and obviously traumatized child to stay with small-town physician – supervised by latter’s girlfriend and in very cramped conditions on his houseboat – instead of doing the sensible thing by, following protocol, alerting childcare officials Overall, a story with an intriguing concept that initially captured my attention but failed to retain it.

[henrimoreaux · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

I was provided a copy of this book for free by the publisher for reviewing purposes.Deprivation is a story set in the tourist haven island of Carratuck, whose only connection to the mainland is a once a day ferry. It covers a span of 8 days which begin with a child being found who is seemingly mute and abandoned, shortly thereafter those on the island report being unable to sleep and an insomnia epidemic unfolds.People quickly become short tempered, aggravated, paranoid and begin to take their frustrations out on each other, meanwhile the island's only doctor is overwhelmed and sleeping tablets don't seem to be helping people. Soon a mysterious character in a surgical mask and gloves begins to circulate his own troublesome theories and things spiral out of control.I thought the idea of the story was good, but at times felt it was a little let down by the manner in which the narrative unfolded. Overall though it was a decent read.

[tumbleweeds_1 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

In reading the synopsis, I was fairly certain that I would enjoy this book, but I wasn't prepared to discover just how great it was! An entire island consumed by insomnia, an urgent care doctor doing his best to maintain the sanity of the inhabitants as the crisis extends for days without relief, and the Boy - a nameless, speechless waif of a young man who may be at the core of the malady - or not, and we're kept guessing on this until the very end of the book. I like reading books by Stephen King, and I think that this book is at least as good, or better, than King's best works. The style is more like literature than pulp fiction, the story is paced well and the suspense kept me glued to my Kindle screen until I reached the end. Highly recommended book!

[linda.a. · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

It is the August holiday season on Carratuck Island, New York. A young boy, clutching a handheld video game and either unable or unwilling to speak, has been found abandoned on the beach but no one knows who he is or where he has come from. However, his appearance seems to coincide with residents and tourists alike finding themselves stricken by crippling insomnia: unable to sleep and desperate for explanations, they start to blame the mysterious child for what is happening to them. As mass hysteria tightens its grip, exhaustion impairs judgment, delusions, hallucinations and paranoia become the norm and mob rule explodes into shocking violence.This compelling story is told from the perspectives of four central characters – Chief of Police Mays as he struggles to keep order; teenager Cort, who, with her friends is competing in a dangerous social media contest for who can stay awake longest; Kathy, an island resident and girlfriend of Dr. Sam Carlson, a former Harvard psychiatrist but now the island’s physician. Battling ghosts from his past and the blurriness of his own insomnia, Sam attempts to discover the cause and a cure for the epidemic, whilst also trying to discover the identity of the Boy – quests which will eventually force him and the child to flee the violent mob which blames the child for the epidemic.It’s hard to know where to begin with my reflections on this powerful, multi-layered psychological thriller because there are so many inter-linked themes and strands which contribute to the inexorable build-up of tension as the story becomes ever-darker and more complex and I don’t want to risk introducing any spoilers! So, in very general terms, here are some of the things which most impressed me as I became enthralled by Roy Freirich’s masterful story-telling.He very effectively captured the disturbing and cumulative effects, both physical and psychological, of chronic insomnia and the desperate measures people will take to seek the oblivion of sleep, with its consequent emotional outlet through dreams. As he relentlessly ratcheted-up the tension, he graphically described how quickly fear and paranoia spread in this small community when people were faced with something which felt inexplicable and threatening and how easily they lost their capacity for rational thought and reasonable behaviour. The resulting state of anomie created conditions which provided fertile ground for mass-hysteria and mob-rule to take hold and, eventually, wield a terrible power. As I became engaged with the story I was reminded (almost inevitably, I think!) of stories such as Lord of the Flies, Mist over Pendle, The Crucible etc. However, that was as a result of the author’s psychologically credible portrayal of people who felt caught up in something which felt beyond their control, rather than because I thought that the story was in any way derivative. I found that the escalating fear and violence created such a palpable tension throughout the novel that there were moments when it felt almost unbearable, when I felt almost as desperate as the gritty-eyed and sleep-deprived characters to find a release from it but, as I needed a resolution, to stop reading never felt like an option! Living close to a region which relies heavily on tourism, and where a very high proportion of local people are employed in low-paid service jobs, I recognised the author’s depictions of the tensions which are so often evident between demanding visitors and full-time local residents. With underlying resentment and ambivalence about their livelihoods being dependent on the holiday-makers simmering barely beneath the surface of their enforced interactions, the powerful sense of inequality can all too often result in various examples of passive-aggressive behaviour.Equally well depicted were his observations on society’s increasing obsession with technology and social media, with the amount of time people spend looking at the screens of their mobile devices rather than engaging face to face with each other, or with the landscape surrounding them. How much does this level of detachment contribute to a lack of empathy, as well as a reduced awareness of the impact our behaviour has on other people? I really appreciated Roy Freirich’s eloquent use of language to create such a compelling story, one which featured not only a cast of vivid, memorable characters, but also many highly-evocative descriptions of the island background against which the drama was being played out. I’m sure that his vast experience as a screenwriter contributed to this being a very visual story, but for me its real strength lies in the fact that it is so multi-layered, encompasses such a wide range of themes (guilt, regret, the search for redemption, post-traumatic stress, scapegoating, mob-rule – to name just a few!) and is so reflectively insightful.I think it must by now be apparent that, from start to finish, I felt totally caught up in this powerful story, reluctant to put it down, even when that ran the risk of not sleeping! So, my recommendation that you should read it for yourself to discover just how good it is, must also come with a warning ... that there won’t be much chance of sleep whilst reading it as you won’t want to put it down, but that there will be a very real chance of insomnia afterwards … because you won’t be able to stop thinking about it!With many thanks to Meerkat Press for allowing me to read this memorable novel in exchange for an honest review.

[lkernagh · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Freirich makes use of his screenwriting experience to give readers an easy to visualize, well paced story that kept me reading late into the night. When it comes to psychological thrillers, I gravitate toward stories that have a slow, building suspense where the boding premonition of bad things to come is a big part of the thrill experience. Deprivation is set, aptly, in a small waterfront community approaching the “end-of-season” visitor wind-down: shabby use-worn vacation rentals filled with half-hearted or overly boisterous holiday-goers mingling with tourist-weary locals. The perfect setting for just about anything to happen, right? The story is based on an interesting premise: What could happen if insomnia were to spread through an isolated community not adequately equipped to deal with the situation? Add to the equation a mysterious, abandoned child no one seems to know anything about and you have a human nature experiment not very different, in the abstract, from other fiction works likes William Golding’s classic Lord of the Flies. Descriptively detailed and finely nuanced, the reader gets the impression early on that something is just not quite right. Told from the perspective of three characters – the veteran local police chief, the younger former psychiatrist now local GP physician for treating minor ailments and a visiting teenager – Freirich keeps the story on track, ratcheting up the suspense in sync with the growing fatigue/malaise/tension of the inhabitants. Yes, there are some shocking scenes (so be forewarned if acts of violence or depictions of self-harm disturb you) but the overall effect is hazy/muted, in keeping with the mental and physical toll the insomnia brings on our narrators.Overall, a solid suspense/thriller story with a believable "what if" premise. I would like to thank Edelweiss Plus and Meerkat Press for providing me with an advanced reader copy in exchange for an honest review.