Another week, another book! She’s on a roll. I will attempt to not give away spoilers.

This past Saturday I finished The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time by Mark Haddon. Overall the book was very humorous and I found myself chuckling or laughing out loud. It is also a very bittersweet story giving an inside look to the thought processes of a 15 years 3 months and 2 days old autistic boy named Christopher.

Christopher’s thoughts are for the most part logical once he explains himself. He takes comfort in systems, predictability, stability, routine, familiarity and rules. He understands things in a very literal, concrete sense. He seems quite genius at maths and puzzles, and his descriptions of the minute workings of the physical world and universe are just mind boggling. But as he says of himself, he is not clever: he is simply observant. He readily admits that other people frighten him because he does not understand their intangible/illogical social and emotional aspects.

The story starts out simply enough: while on his regular evening walk around the neighborhood, Christopher stumbles upon the body of his neighbor’s dog. Christopher likes dogs and is upset as he can be about it’s sudden (and apparently violent) demise, and decides to take it upon himself to sleuth out the mystery of the dog’s death – albeit against his father’s wishes. This dismay’s Christopher, who takes great pleasure in playing detective like Sherlock Holmes – it’s an opportunity to have a project: solving the puzzle of Wellington’s death. As he continues to search for clues in a systematic way, little does he know he becomes closer and closer to revealing a reality far from the familiar, predictable world that makes him feel so safe and secure.