Last week I finished a book for my neighborhood book club. Titled "The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time," this book tells a tale from the perspective of a young autistic man who is trying to solve the mystery of his neighbor's murdered dog.
In the course of the story, the main character makes several key discoveries about his family, though he doesn't seem to really understand the full implication of what everything means.
Because people with autism don't understand the difference between faces and other objects (such as a doorknob or a light switch), they aren't as likely to understand sarcasm, emotions or other personal communications. Autistics do not process the context of the words as communicated by body language and facial expressions, and therefore the literal meaning of dialogue is accepted as is.
The character in this book is very high functioning, but ultimately the development of characters and any understanding of their motivations, must be inferred through the reported dialogue.
I read this book very quickly and the drama of events helped keep the pace moving, but ultimately it wasn't as satisfying as other novels because I felt "disconnected" from all the other characters ... probably not unlike the story's narrator. All in all, it's a very interesting read, especially for anyone curious about what it may be like to be an autistic person.
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