I just finished up listening to the audio book The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time by Mark Haddon. The title is a little long but once you get into the book, you’ll understand the reason.
This one came highly recommended to me by our son Karl. It’s not a long book and I could tell that the book was a “gotta read” as he was carrying it around with him and sneaking in chances to read a few pages here and there.
He finished the book and said -Mom you HAVE to read this. So I checked my on line library and amazingly I was only the second person on the list….I could wait that long.
So what did I think? I really liked it. The book is told by a boy with autism. It doesn’t say that the book is classified as young adult but I would classify it there. I would say it’s a coming of age story for Christopher, a 15 year old boy with autism. Being the story is “written” by Christopher readers get to see a little bit into the world of what it might be like to have autism for both Christopher and his parents.
Here’s what Amazon had to say:
“The fifteen-year-old narrator of this ostensible murder mystery is even more emotionally remote than the typical crime-fiction shamus: he is autistic, prone to fall silent for weeks at a time and unable to imagine the interior lives of others. This might seem a serious handicap for a detective, but when Christopher stumbles on the dead body of his neighbor’s poodle, impaled by a pitchfork, he decides to investigate. Christopher understands dogs, whose moods are as circumscribed as his own (“happy, sad, cross and concentrating”), but he’s deaf to the nuances of people, and doesn’t realize until too late that the clues point toward his own house and a more devastating mystery. This original and affecting novel is a triumph of empathy; whether describing Christopher’s favorite dream (of a virus depopulating the planet) or his vision of the universe collapsing in a thunder of stars, the author makes his hero’s severely limited world a thrilling place to be. ”
Amazon readers gave the book 4.3 stars. I would say 4.5. I really liked the book. As I was reading some of the reviews left by Amazon readers, some were disappointed by the ending. I wasn’t. The ending wasn’t exciting but it was cumulative. It’s a quick read…listen to it if you get a chance.
My now-16 yr-old grandson is on the spectrum and I read that book when he was very young. It helped me understand and appreciate his situation.
It’s also been made into a play
It sounds like a easy and fun read, glad you enjoyed it.
Hi Jo — Just read your post and thought I would mention another like book of interest. Ginny Moon is a recent publication by first time author Benjamin Ludwig. It’s the story of a young girl with autism and her struggles to find her “forever home”. The author has a daughter with autism. I chose it for my Book Club and it was wel received.
I just checked out the book Susan. Thanks for the recommendation.
You’re welcome. I hope you enjoy this one.