Martha Gies

Up All Night Martha Gies First edition

Night, inhospitable and dangerous, tantalizes the imagination. Rarely are we awake to see it through. This fascinating collection of voices from the graveyard shift shows us who is out there in the dark while the rest of us sleep.

In Up All Night a baker, a nude dancer, a flower market wholesaler, a longshoreman, a newspaper distributor, a shelter worker, a zookeeper, and sixteen other night workers candidly share personal histories. Their stories about night work-and about their lives during the daylight hours-are often funny, often poignant. Some work at night by choice-to earn higher wages or to avoid bosses. For others, such as recent immigrants or parents with day-working spouses, their only option may be the midnight shift.

Author and night owl Martha Gies guides readers on a nocturnal tour of unique workplaces-the waiting ambulances that encircle the darkened city, the maze of conveyor belts at the industrial bakery, the Internet service provider's help desk. She visits and vividly describes the cold, gritty, and isolated settings of night work-the truck cab, the silhouetted cubicle, the empty street.

Up All Night gives us a rare insider's look at the unseen workers who keep the city humming after dark.