The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time by Mark Haddon

Year of Publication: 2003

Genre: Novel, Mystery

Country: United Kingdom

The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time is an interestingly ‘out of the ordinary’ kind of a novel. By this proclamation – Out of the Ordinary – I intend to suggest the author’s brilliance for giving a unique voice to the narrator, Christopher John Francis Boone, who is a rare character I hardly meet in novels. It is therefore a privilege to read about this character who has a special kind of disability I have barely read about.

Although you would not find in a single sentence the mention of Asperger disorder, a condition with which the narrator is battling with, we are informed by his condition through his voice and with his interaction with the people around him.

Partly mystery, the story begins that Christopher John Francis Boone spots a dead dog on the lawn of a neighbor’s house and as he approaches the dead dog, he works his way out to solving how the dog got killed. As he takes upon himself to investigate this mystery, he soon finds himself with the police – perhaps – he becomes a prime suspect as he is the only person seen with the dead dog on the lawn. Later, his investigation would take him from house to house, trying every means possible to find out who might have caused this harm to the dog.

The mystery aside, we get to learn more about Christopher’s likes and dislikes and we come to learn about his brilliance in mathematics. With this, he chooses to write his story with numbered paragraphs: the numbers are prime numbers starting from 2, then 3, then 5, and so on. Christopher knows all the countries of the world and their capitals and every prime number. He does not like the colour yellow. His enthusiasm for animals is evident in the story – for instance – he loves to be around dogs.

Written in a clear and coherence language, you will ultimately love this story and would find humor and emotions not neglected from this wonderfully told story. I am certainly convinced that this story is for all – in that – both young adults and adults would read this and find it so meaningful, understandable and worth reading. You are certain to have compassion for people living with Asperger disorder by the end of reading this book.

The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time won the Commonwealth Writer’s prize in 2004 for Best First book and the 2003 Whitbread Book of the Year.