Immersing readers in the vortex of autism seems to promise a world of chaos, and yet Christopher's mind is surprisingly clear in the absence of obscuring emotional brushstrokes, he relies on sharp images, which are taut and devoid of discoloration.
It is also, surprisingly, a novel of manners, vividly depicting a world we may be too numb to see. "This is a murder mystery novel," declares Christopher. Now, spurred on by certain events, Christopher is compelled to venture out, in a quest to discover Wellington's killer. He has been living with his father and his pet rat, Toby, leaving his street only to attend a center for special needs a few hours a day. The murder of the neighbor's dog, Wellington, as well as the recent death of Christopher's mother, plunges the boy into a journey of self-discovery. Yet through the smoke and mirrors of his character's oddly dispassionate view of the world around him, Haddon manages to rouse intense and devoted interest. Haddon has taken on a Herculean task: using the prism of autism, a condition in which, according to popular notion, a person cannot comprehend emotion.
Recent successful examples come to mind, such as Jonathan Lethem's Motherless Brooklyn, with its protagonist suffering from Tourette's Syndrome, and Middlesex by Jeffrey Eugenides, which explores hermaphroditism. Thus begins a jolting spiral of events in the life of one of this year's most memorable characters, Christopher John Francis Boone, the narrator of Mark Haddon's debut novel, The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time.Ī first-person narration can be a difficult leap for a novelist - the depiction of an unknown mind - but even more so when the point of view is further challenged by an unfamiliar disability. The neighbor runs out screaming, police arrive, the boy hits a policeman and ends up in jail. It's midnight, and an autistic 15-year-old boy is sitting on the lawn, holding his neighbor's dead dog, covered with blood.
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