For people to whom sleep comes easily, the night is a welcoming place. For those who hold no visa for the state of REM, minutes pass like hours. The brain of the insomniac defies sleep with endless musings and ramblings, recriminations and replayed conversations.

Here, then, is a mini-Baedeker for the dream-deprived, designed to divert your gaze from the leering glare of the digital clock with soothing diversions and charming distractions, including:

• Pithy reflections on insomnia from thinkers and writers ranging from Job, Dorothy Parker, and Marcel Proust to Shakespeare, Bob Dylan, F. Scott Fitzgerald, and Leadbelly
• Eye-opening facts about famous insomniacs, including Marilyn Monroe's explanation of her relentless wakefulness
• 85 topics of regret, remorse, resentment, and recrimination, from the age-old question "What if everything my mother told me turns out to be true?" to the timeless favorite "Why did I have unprotected sex with my personal trainer?"
• A tongue-in-cheek guide to sleeping aids, from herbs and pharmaceuticals to sex and Wagner