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The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time Summary
Christopher Boon, a mathematically gifted boy of fifteen with Asperger's syndrome, sees a dog lying on the grass in front of his neighbor’s house with a fork sticking out of it. The dog is dead. He goes over to hug the dog and soon the neighbor, Mrs Shears, emerges from her house, screaming. She thinks Christopher has killed the dog.
The police arrive and Christopher is taken to the station and, shortly after, his father arrives to testify for Christopher and take him home. The strange death of Wellington prompts Christopher to search for his killer. As a school assignment, Christopher’s class is told to write a story. Inspired by this, he decides to write a detective story, the very one we are reading: The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time.
Taking his inspiration from the Sherlock Holmes stories, Christopher knocks on the doors of various neighbors to try to find out what happened to Wellington. His father is furious when he finds out what Christopher is doing, and forbids him from continuing his ‘detecting’. Not understanding the logic behind his father’s aggression or his insistence that he stop, Christopher continues his search and talks to one of his neighbors, Mrs Alexander. Christopher asks her about Mrs Shears and asks, since Mr Shears left his wife, if she thought he had something to do with the murder. Mrs Alexander reveals that Mr Shears and Christopher’s mother were having an affair, before Christopher’s mother died two years before.
Not long after, Christopher’s father discovers his book, screams at Christopher, grabs him and throws his book away. While at work, Christopher looks for his book among his father’s belongings and finds letters addressed to him, from his mother at an address in London, written a year and a half after she died. Once Christopher realizes his father lied to him, he feels sick and lies in bed. His father finds him and realizes what has happened and apologizes, telling Christopher he was only trying to protect him and that he can trust him. He then tells Christopher that it was he who killed Wellington because, after a relationship with Mrs Shears when Christopher’s mother had left, he had an argument with her and the dog came after him and all his feelings just came bubbling up.
Terrified by the news of his father as a murderer, Christopher slips out of the house with his pet rat Toby and a swiss army knife while his father is asleep. He starts his journey to find his mother in London. The police have been informed that Christopher is running away and they try to catch him. At one point during the journey he loses Toby and follows him along the tube tracks, getting back onto the platform just before the train arrives.
Christopher finally arrives at his mother’s and tells her what has happened and that he thought she was dead. He goes to sleep and wakes up to hear his father shouting. His father enters Christopher’s room and tries to apologize. Christopher won’t talk to his father and insists he lives with his mother, thus ending her relationship with Mr Shears. He takes his A-level in maths and finally allows his father back into his life. His father suggests that they work on a project together where he proves to Christopher that he can be trusted and, to show how serious he is, buys a puppy that they can look after together. They begin spending more time together. Christopher plans to take further maths A-level a year later, and then physics A-level, and then he plans to get a first class honors degree and become a scientist – he knows this is possible because he solved a mystery, went to London alone and wrote a book.
July 26, 2015
Having primarily dealt in children’s books, Mark Haddon’s debut novel, which was immediately adapted into a hit Broadway play, came as a bit of a surprise. Unless, of course, you’ve read the novel, The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nighttime. One of the most interesting and provocative books of this day, Haddon writes a tale that doesn’t follow any particular genre. At times, it’s sad and emotional, exploring the mind of its young, autistic protagonist. At other times, it’s charming and brilliantly funny, using the logic-based view of the hero to make witty observations of the world.
At the start, the book presents itself as a mystery novel, about a boy’s search to find the killer of his neighbor’s dog. As the novel unfolds, however, it reveals itself as a unique coming-of-age novel about a boy with a mental condition and the challenges his parents face while raising him.
It’s hard not to love Christopher, the narrator and protagonist. He is hilariously blunt and far smarter than the average fifteen-year-old. It’s also hard not to feel a twinge of pity for this kid when you have such an honest insight into his mind. He describes things factually, but this makes it even more emotional for the reader because what he sees as normal is far from what average people face in their everyday lives. For example, because Christopher hates the color yellow, when he sees four yellow cars in a row on the way to school, that day is a Black Day. On Black Days, he doesn’t speak to anyone for the whole afternoon, instead sitting in the corner of the library, groaning, with his head pressed into the joint between two walls to calm himself down.
Christopher’s dad is also easy to sympathize with, although the reader may not face the distinctive challenges he has to overcome as a parent. It’s obvious that he tries his hardest to patiently care for his son, even when Christopher presents struggles where most kids don’t. He loves his son and asks whether Christopher understands this. To this, Christopher replies he does because “loving someone is helping them when they get in trouble, and looking after them, and telling them the truth, and Father looks after me when I get into trouble, like coming to the police station, and he looks after me by cooking meals for me, and he always tells me the truth, which means that he loves me.”
While most authors lack the experience and knowledge to write from the perspective of an autistic child, Haddon is highly qualified to write such a novel. Shortly after graduating college, he worked with autistic individuals. The experiences he gained from this gave him insight and compassion toward those with this mental condition. He warns, however, not to treat his novel like a textbook towards treating those with behavioral issues.
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