The main part of this book deals with a week in the life of a 15 year-old boy called Chris. Chris lives in Swindon, England, with his widowed father. The remarkable feature of Chris' story is the fact that he has Asperger syndrome (AS).
Despite the physical and emotional limitations AS places on him, Chris is highly intelligent (especially gifted in mathematics), articulate and has cultivated a wide range of interests. Chris is as perfectly candid about the difficulties he has as a result of AS as he is about his other interests; and as he tells his tale, we get a vivid insight into his simple and yet complex inner-world.
He begins his story with his discovery of the body Wellington, a neighbour's pet dog. Wellington has clearly been murdered, and Chris (being a big fan of Sherlock Holmes) decides to investigate this curious incident. Big mistake. Chris is just about to have his world blown apart.
I'll be brief. I was enjoying this book a lot. Chris was an engaging and interesting narrator. I liked what he had to say about his interests, and it was fascinating to see the world through his eyes. He was able to give me a new appreciation of things that I either dismiss or take for granted.
It was all going very well, and then something happened. All the charm disappeared from the narrative, never to return. The characters became caricatures, and dysfunctional ones at that. Very unpleasant and unappealing.
It is hard to understand how either the author or his editors allowed this to happen, but they did. All I will say is: A+ for the first two-thirds of the book, F for the rest.
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