Book Review: The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night Time by Mark Haddon

The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night Time

A powerfully written window into an Asperger's person's mind.

A brief synopsis

Despite not fitting into my normal book preferences (alternate-world fantasy, sci-fi or action fantasy, if you must know), I found this book a surprisingly compelling read. It gave me a snapshot into the life and mind of an Asperger's boy - something that I hadn't given much thought about before.  

The story is written from the perspective of Christopher Boone, a young, self-elected detective with Asperger's syndrome. He hates the colours brown and yellow, and can name every prime number up to 7,063. He starts of by saying that this book will not be funny, as he cannot understand jokes, but his way of describing the little details and noticing pointless facts in (sometimes dangerous) situations gives it a different style of humour.

Mark Haddon is such a good writer that often I'd forget that he was even writing it, as Christopher Boone was such a real and lifelike character. 

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The story begins with a dead dog. It wasn't just any dog, it was Christopher's neighbour's poodle. Anyway, it was murdered, and murder is wrong, so Christopher takes it upon himself to find the culprit of the crime, much to his dad's annoyance. The story follows Christopher on his journey, as he discovers much more than he planned to, eventually tearing his world perspective apart. 

It was mainly violence free, and despite the fact that the story starts with a skewered dead dog, it wasn't gory at all. This was due to the way Christopher writes, describing everything factually and concisely, meaning that there wasn't any repulsive description. However, it did contain a lot of bad language, so I' recommend this book for teens with previous experience of heavy swearing. I won't suggest an age, as it depends on the child. 

But, overlooking that, it was an incredible book, and really helped me understand more about Asperger's syndrome. It made me sympathise with Chris, as well as with those around him. Plus. it was a great mystery, and the dry humour mixed with Haddon's writing style made it an enjoyable read.