The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night–Time
I just finished The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time and thought I'd share some nice extracts. Incase you didn't know, the book's about a 15yr old autistic boy who tries to solve the murder mystery of a dead dog he discovers. The book is a real insight into his observations and logic that he uses to explain his perspective on life. Here are some of my favourite bits:
"Prime numbers are what is left when you have taken all the patterns away. I think prime numbers are like life. They are very logical but you could never work out the rules, even if you spent all your time thinking about them."
"The word metaphor means carrying something from one place to another…and it is when you describe something by using a word for something that it isn't. This means that the word metaphor is a metaphor. I think it should be called a lie because a pig is not like day and people don't have skeletons in their cupboards."
"Mother used to say that Christopher was a nice name because it was a story about being kind and helpful, but I do not want my name to mean a story…I want my name to mean me."
"...there aren't any lines in space, so you could join bits of Orion to bits of Lepus* or Taurus or Gemini and say that they were a constellation called The Bunch of Grapes or Jesus or The Bicycle...And anyway, Orion is not a hunter or a coffee maker or a dinosaur. It is just Betelguese and Bellatrix and Alnilam and Rigel an 17 other stars I don't know the names of. And they are nuclear explosions billions of miles away. And that is the truth."
"My memory is like a film. That is why I am really good at remembering things, like the conversations I have written down in this book, and what people were wearing, and what they smelled like because my memory has a smelltrack which is like a soundtrack. And when people ask me to remember something I can simply press Rewaind and Fast Forward and Pause like on a video recorder…"
"And I am going to finish this chapter with some interesting facts about Sherlock Holmes:
1. Sherlock Holmes is never described as wearing a deerstalker hat…The deerstalker hat was invented by a man called Sidney Paget who did the illustrations for the original book.
2. In the riginal Sherlock Holmes stories Sherlock Holmes never says, 'Elementary my dear Watson." He only says this in films and on the television."
If you want to see the world from a new perspective check the book out!
02 Jan 2005 12:29
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[Skip to the latest comment]I got it for Christmas, it was excellent.
02 Jan 2005, 15:15
I read it in a day on holiday last year – just couldn't put it down. I love the chapter numbering.
03 Jan 2005, 16:06
Yup – I read it in 4 hours one day. I don't really read that much – but I couldn't put it down. Amazing. I think everybody should read it.
Did make me think I was suffering from mild Asperge's though, so it was quite interesting at the time…
Turns out, I'm just a bit fucked in the head, and nowt special with names and things…
Ho-hum…
Bit of deviation there – anyway… Tell everyone you know to read this book!
xx
11 Feb 2005, 10:38
julie weber
i read that book. it reminded me of evan (from jeff and evan of nyc…), but i don’t know that i actually liked the book. there were some amazing quotes, some of which you have picked out, but i doubt i’d recommend it to someone. or, rather, i wouldn’t demand that someone read it as i do other books ( THE BRIEF AND FRIGHTENING REIGN OF PHIL: novella (of sorts) by George Saunders. kind of sci-fi socio-political jibberish. very funny. deep in that satirical way. i highly recommend it), but i’ve mentioned it to special educaiton teachers i work with.
07 Oct 2006, 02:37
cash
hey this book was probably the lamest peice of shit book i have ever touched, nearly as lame as wuthering heights and you know how they say you can’t judge a book by it’s cover well in this case you can shit book shit cover.
02 Mar 2007, 02:56
Thinks cash is mature
way to be mature about things, how old are you honestly?
15 Mar 2007, 20:47
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05 Sep 2007, 23:22
Allen
something like John Safran Foer’s Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close, but I think Foer was more consistent. Nonetheless, bought his A Spot of Bother and will get through it.. so far, my head is working harder on this one :)
11 Oct 2007, 07:17
asdfasdfasdf
cash is a jackass
18 Oct 2007, 04:19
oni
great read!...fantastic…really intresting novel…im doing it for higher english…well doing an essay on the theme of trust right now and its a fantastic novel and really good if you wana do a presonal study on it(for students).
because it has great quotes and alot of major themes and it also makes you see the world in a whole different prespective.
x thanks
14 Nov 2007, 11:57
redspider
cash is a jackass this book was a nice book to read and a good way to find out how autistic kids behave!!
cash try actually reading the book then reply
17 Nov 2007, 19:22
britt
i thought the book was pretty alright. dunno what the fuss is about, i could imagine other authors reading the book and getting pissed off at mark haddon winning lots of awards for it , possibly thinking they could have written a silly, fun book in the eyes of an autistic boy too, but choose not to because it is never going to seriously touch someone or leave a great impression, but merely have any tom dick or harry think it was readable. i dont hate the book but the novelty wore off pretty quickly and i really dont see what all the fuss is about.
But i guess it was just a silly, laid back read.
21 Nov 2007, 04:36
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