You know that age-old advice that if you're swimming and feel yourself getting pulled out to sea by a rip current, to swim across rather than fighting it? Imagine doing that, but for your insomnia.

I have never read a writer who could turn the lemons of sleep deprivation into the lemonade of creative inspiration quite like Annabel Abbs-Streets does in "Sleepless: Unleasing the Subversive Power of the Night Self." The English novelist and nonfiction author had, by her own admission, never been a great sleeper. But when she was hit with the deaths of her father and stepfather in rapid, peak COVID-era succession, the sandman took a more extended leave of absence. What could have become a mental and physical health crisis instead served as an catalyst for Abbs-Streets to get to know her "night self," as she explored the curious, creative and quiet power of those midnight hours.

Along the way, she discovered she had unique company in the female artists and writers — from Sylvia Plath to Lee Krasner — who carved out space for personal liberation in the middle of the night. Weaving history, scientific research on brain chemistry and Abbs-Streets's own personal nocturnal explorations, "Sleepless" is uniquely engaging and hopeful account of a condition that is more typically a truly miserable experience. And while the author acknowledges that "a good night's sleep is still the most fantastic thing ever," she offers an upside — especially for women — to wakefulness.

I talked to Abbs-Streets via Zoom recently about why sleep loss looks different in women than men, learning to not be afraid of the dark, and making friends with the night self.

This conversation has been lightly edited and condensed for clarity.

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Talk to me about the galvanizing experience that starts you on this path of meeting your night self.

I haven't been a great sleeper for about 25 years, since I was pregnant for the first time, actually. That never got any better, and I was sort of okay with that. I just read a lot of books. But then a series of deaths happened within the space of about six weeks. It was also during COVID, before the vaccines had appeared.

So I had all my children at home and my mother and my stepmother were suddenly bereaved and isolated on their own. I took it upon myself to look after after everyone and everything, to organize all the funerals and give the eulogy and write the obituaries and do all the admin that comes with a death. I didn't really have space to grieve. I think grieving really needs its own space, and I didn't have that. But night became that space.

"Grieving really needs its own space, and I didn't have that. But night became that space. "

First of all, of course, I tried to fight that because like everyone I'm told you must have seven hours of sleep — even though I've never had this. I thought, even more than ever, I need to sleep. But by this point, nothing worked. I started off trying the usual, the melatonin, the [cannabis-based drug] CBD. Absolutely nothing had any effect whatsoever. But I had already started working on a book on women who worked at night. I'd always been interested in how so many women created such different things in the middle of the night. And my editor said, "That's a great book. You write something........

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