The Man Who Could Not Sleep and Other Mysteries
The Man Who Could Not Sleep and Other Mysteries is a collection of radio plays by the British thriller writer Michael Gilbert, first published in 2011 by the British company Robert Hale and unpublished in the United States. It contains two long, previously uncollected radio plays, as well as synopses of two proposed stage plays that were never subsequently written. It also has an introduction by John Cooper and three appendices. The locales of the plays are mostly in London and its environs. Two of the many recurring characters that Gilbert created over his exceedingly long writing career, Nap Rumbold and Hargest Macrea, are in "The Game Called Justice". As usual with Gilbert, the tone of the stories is civilized and even occasionally light-hearted, but there are always elements of bleakness beneath the urbane surface, particularly in "The Last Chapter". "Michael was an exceptionally fine storyteller, but he's hard to classify," said one of his American publishers after his death. "He's not a hard-boiled writer in the classic sense, but there is a hard edge to him, a feeling within his work that not all of society is rational, that virtue is not always rewarded.". Gilbert, who was appointed CBE in 1980, was a founder-member of the British Crime Writers' Association. The Mystery Writers of America named him a Grand Master in 1988 and in 1990 he was presented Bouchercon's Lifetime Achievement Award.

Contents in order
Introduction, page 7, by John Cooper
The Man Who Could Not Sleep—A Serial thriller in six parts, page 14 — radio play featuring Henry Bohun
The Hampstead Flat, page 15 
The Early Hours of the Morning, page 33
Miss Tappett and Her Tortoises, page 51
Trouble at the Law Society, page 70
Closing the Gap, page 90 
The Traveller's Rest, page 111
My Aunt She Died a Month Ago, page 135 — proposed play synopsis
The Game Called Justice, page 142 — proposed play synopsis featuring Noel Anthony Pontarlier ("Nap") Rumbold and Hargest Macrae
The Last Chapter, page 155 — radio play
Appendix A — The Casebook of Henry Montacute Bohun, page 215
Appendix B — Radio plays by Michael Gilbert, page 217
Appendix C — Television plays and serial by Michael Gilbert, page 220

Notes

External links

2011 short story collections
Robert Hale books
Mystery short story collections
British short story collections
British radio dramas
Short story collections by Michael Gilbert