The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time

        The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time by Mark Haddon recounts the tale of Christopher Boone, an autistic 15-year-old who discovers Mrs. Shears’s dog, Wellington, lying lifelessly with a pitchfork embedded in its stomach. Being an aspiring detective and advocate for the punishment of wrongful deeds, Christopher embarks on a search for the murderer. Unfortunately, his search is cut short when he punches a police officer and lands in jail, hereby demonstrating his lack of social awareness. His single father asks the police officer to give Christopher some slack and he is released, free to continue with the investigation. He decides to write a book detailing his findings, naming it The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time. Through some careful detective work, Christopher later finds some hidden letters written to him from his mother. He realises that what his father had earlier said (that his mother had died of a heart attack) was entirely untrue. Confronted with so much information and stimuli, he curls up in a ball on his bed, vomits, and groans for several hours until his father comes home. His father, Ed, confesses that he covered up the fact that Christopher’s mother had moved to London with Mr. Shears, a man with whom she had had an affair. He also admits to killing Wellington when in a fight with Mrs. Shears. Christopher is shocked and no longer feels safe with his father. Consequently, he sneaks out of the house at night and, through a long and confusing journey, finds himself at his mother’s doorstep in London. His mother is overjoyed to see him and takes off work for a few days to spend some time with her son. Unfortunately, Mr. Shears does not welcome Christopher in the same way and, over a conflict involving the newfound family member, his mother moves back to Swindon with Christopher, living in a rented apartment. His mother agrees to let Ed spend some daily time with Christopher. Christopher is still very terrified of his father at this point, and refuses to talk to him. To somehow make up for his behaviour, Ed buys Christopher a Golden Retriever, and tells Christopher that he wants to rebuild his trust slowly, “no matter how long it takes.”

       I really enjoyed reading this book for a number of reasons. Firstly, I could relate to the main character because I, too, think in patterns and have a mathematical brain. For example, I find it hard not to walk in steps not divisible by four. I also like symmetry, and don’t like when things aren’t equal. I also liked reading this book because I could never predict what the outcome would be. The greatest surprise would have to be when Christopher discovered that his mother was, in fact, alive. I was even more surprised when Christopher calmly thought about what to do. He seemed emotionless, not appearing either happy nor betrayed.

        The author, Mark Haddon, succeeded very well in using various literary techniques to portray the characteristics of someone with Asperger syndrome. The first thing that I noticed was that the chapters were prime numbers. Scattered throughout the book are various math and logic puzzles. These two characteristics exemplify Christopher’s extremely mathematical brain, which may, in fact, be heightened due to the fact that he is autistic. Another technique used was the interchanging between a chapter of plot development and a chapter of seemingly irrelevant info on Christopher’s inner life. One moment the reader would be learning about who killed Wellington, and the next Christopher would be explaining why there is no God. Also, whenever Christopher would describe his surroundings, he would consistently use run-on sentences, which would normally be long lists of things that he was observing. And finally, when Christopher tries to save his pet rat, Toby, on the tracks of the London underground, he doesn’t understand how close he came to dying. This is an example of dramatic irony, where the reader, in this case, knew that he was almost killed, and would have been if a stranger hadn’t pulled him off the tracks. At this, Christopher was confronted with two things that he detested:

1. Being touched

2. Strangers