Today I’m very pleased to welcome Anna Thomson to my blog, to introduce us to her favourite book of the year.

My favourite read this year was the non-fiction book “Why We Sleep,” by Matthew Walker. I began to read it as research for my writing and was riveted. It’s a fascinating and accessible insight into our current knowledge of sleep, what it is and why we need it.

Walker covers research into not only sleep but dreams and the role of sleep in the prevention of serious diseases. There’s also discussion of how many great thinkers have recruited their subconscious and pre-sleep states to assist in problem solving.

I often hear people say “This book changed my life.” This one actually did change mine and I recommend it frequently! It made me fundamentally rethink my (lackadaisical) attitude to getting enough quality sleep, and reassess its importance for wellbeing, clear thought and creativity.

Anna Thomson (who writes as Anna Bell) is the winner of the inaugural Varuna/New England Writers’ Centre Fellowship. A a freelance editor and writer, she has an honours degree in literature. She has three published short stories, White Christmas, Santa’s Little Helper and The King of Winter in anthologies by Christmas Press. Anna lives in New England with her husband and a giant homicidal house plant.