Review: The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nighttime by Mark Haddon

Christopher Boone is 15 years, 3 months and 2 days old. He knows all the countries of the world and can recite their capitals. He likes animals, but he doesn't enjoy people - their facial expressions are too difficult to understand. He knows all the prime numbers up 7,057. Christopher is autistic. When Christopher decides to investigate the mysterious death of a neighbor's dog, he keeps a record of his findings, and his detection leads him in a direction he never expected.

This is an astonishing book. Autism isn't something that I know a great deal about, though I have known a few people who had it, and I found it absolutely fascinating to get this peek inside an autistic mind. This is a fictional work, based on Haddon's work with autistic children, but I think it comes as close as possible to reality.

The book is written in journal style, and it jumps about quite a bit as Christopher talks about prime numbers, why he doesn't like the color yellow, and why dogs are better than people. There are lots of diagrams that Christopher uses to organize his world ina way he understands. You get an inside view on the stresses of raising a child with autism and the toll it has taken on Christopher's parents, even though Christopher doesn't understand it himself. One of my favorite quotes of all time is from Marcel Proust and says "The only true voyage of discovery is not seeing new landscapes, but having new eyes. Both heartbreaking and hopeful, this book will give you new eyes.

My final word: 5 out of 5. If you know someone with autism, or you've ever wondered about autism, you need to read this book.

Mark Haddon has a bizarre and non-intuitive but interesting-to-look-at website which is worth checking out. You'll know what I mean after you click the link. Good luck finding what you're looking for.

Click the book cover image to purchase from Amazon.

Second opinions:
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