Lisa of Troy's Reviews > The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time

If you loved The Good Sister, this book is for you!

The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time is a UK story about a 15 year-old boy named Christopher Boone. Christopher is a brilliant person who is extremely analytical and starts to investigate the death of his neighbor's dog, a poodle named Wellington. Who killed Wellington and why? Christopher will be pushed well beyond his comfort zone while unabashedly telling the truth and going on an impossible journey. How comfortable are we to change and adventure?

This book was delightfully funny as Christopher tries to solve the murder of Wellington. Christopher uses his skills of analysis to matter-of-factly investigate this horrible crime, and he vividly describes how he goes about the world, the level of detail that he observes. It was a wonderful reminder to take time to look around at the world around us. He also spoke about Stranger Danger and how uncomfortable he is when speaking to other people. For many people, conversations do not flow naturally and being bombarded by chaos and overwhelmed by stimulus is quite challenging.

The characters in this book were well developed - these are my favorite types of characters because they are imperfect but try their best especially for Christopher. This book truly is British, not an American author pretending to be British. How can I tell? Well, in my last job, my entire team was based out of London so not a day would go by that I wasn't on the phone with someone from the UK. Also, I have actually been to London so I would consider myself to be a bit more than average on UK terminology. One of the things that I found simply delightful with this book was the British approach. This is very difficult to put into words, but I shall do my best. The British usually respond less hysterical and with less overaction than Americans. For example, when I was in London, there was a protestor who had glued himself to the street. The police were freeing him and taking him down to the station. A large group of people (myself included) gathered around to watch. The protestor was sitting quite calmly while the police gently put goggles over his eyes and started the process. When they freed him, the protestor calmly accepted his fate and allowed the police to do their job. A man next to me explained in a matter of fact tone that they usually just take you down to the station for half a day and release you. He had a rather good plate of eggs when he was last detained by the police.

In America, the police would be making the onlookers disband, and the protestors aren't really that committed to actually glue themselves to anything. If someone does encounter the police, usually they are thrashing about and making the whole process as difficult as possible.

As an American reading this book, I found it so interesting how the various people interacted with Christopher because I can assure you that Americans would have reacted so very differently, and I found it rather refreshing that the adults weren't hyper-protective and allowed Christopher to fully experience his journey (to some degree). There really should be a slightly Americanized version of this book though because although I do know that The Underground is called The Tube and boot is actually the trunk of a car, there were a few times when I was a bit confused. For example, Christopher was talking about how he didn't like metaphors. One of them was "I've had a pig of a day." This phrase is not used in the The States so Christopher wasn't the only one confused.

Overall, I thought that this was a delightful read. One of my family members (a bit younger than Christopher) has a genius IQ. He is extremely talented in math and can easily build almost anything. Bring something home from IKEA, blink, and he can put it together. But he can't spell to save his life. This book was a refreshing reminder that not every person fits the traditional mold and not to judge a person based on one skillset. It's a short read - pick this one up!

This was one of the 100 Books to Read Before You Die According to the BBC: https://www.listchallenges.com/bbcs-t...

2024 Reading Schedule
Jan Middlemarch
Feb The Grapes of Wrath
Mar Oliver Twist
Apr Madame Bovary
May A Clockwork Orange
Jun Possession
Jul The Folk of the Faraway Tree Collection
Aug Crime and Punishment
Sep Heart of Darkness
Oct Moby-Dick
Nov Far From the Madding Crowd
Dec A Tale of Two Cities

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