Reviews with content warning for Animal cruelty - El curioso incidente del perro a medianoche

It was really hard for me to finish this book. It made me feel scatterbrained.
Also, I hope children are not reading this book for school. There are too many curse words in it. This is not something I would want my child reading.

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daybreakreads's review against another edition

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funny hopeful lighthearted reflective sad slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.5

I would describe it as “cute”. I listened to the audiobook, but I know the physical book has illustrations that might have made it more endearing. I was looking for something similar to The Maid by Nita Prose or Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine in the sense that I love socially awkward narrators. In comparison, the narrator here feels much less well-rounded and developed and more of a stereotype of autism rather than a real person. It was still cute and endearing, but it was hard to feel real connection or empathy to a one-sided character. There isn’t a lot of plot; it’s mainly focused on showing how the narrator sees the world and interacts with it so much differently than the rest of us. It’s just hard to enjoy that kind of book when the narrator is hard to love. Ending was a bit cute but that’s it really.

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besidemyshelf's review against another edition

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emotional hopeful informative inspiring mysterious sad fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

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charliesmith1564's review against another edition

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challenging emotional hopeful informative mysterious reflective sad tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

5.0

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ethan_irg_hsieh's review against another edition

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adventurous inspiring medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

3.75

Nice book, really vividly depicts the life and challenges of an autist through the lenses of a child within the autism spectrum.

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malbenigno's review against another edition

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mysterious reflective fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

3.0

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kaylamoran's review against another edition

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adventurous emotional hopeful sad medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.0

I'm genuinely torn on this book. As far as enjoyment, I loved it. But I don't think I can give it more than a 3 or recommend it because it just felt like a collection of autistic stereotypes clumsily thrown together. Not that any of the behaviours are necessarily inaccurate, but I'm tired of how autism is only ever portrayed one way, we aren't all like Sheldon Cooper or Rainman. We need different portrayals too.

Also, I'm a bit alarmed by how many reviews describe Christopher as high functioning. It's not the functioning labels that bother me, I only recently learned they were problematic myself. It's the fact that Christopher clearly has very high support needs, and the fact that he's being considered high functioning reminds me of how autistics who are good at masking aren't believed. If this is what's considered high functioning, we need more of an understanding of what autism is.

And I blame no one for that (if you wrote that in a review I totally get it, and I'm not upset and I don't think you did anything offensive). Because it's BECAUSE this is the only portrayal we get that that causes the lack of understanding, it's not the reader's fault at all. The lack of societal understanding of autism is largely due to this.

So yeah. Portrayals like this are the reason I hear stuff like "you can't be autistic, you're too good at reading emotions" or "you're sarcastic" or "you're too pretty" or "girls aren't autistic." And I guess it's not the books fault either, because it's a valid experience of autism and some people do fit this description. I guess I just wish it wasn't the only one we saw.

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spcandybars's review against another edition

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This book was just highly uncomfortable for me and feels much longer than it is. The main character and primary perspective is that of a teenage boy with an unnamed “emotional disorder” that is heavily implied to be autism. I’m sure there are things others can relate to but as one kind of autistic reader, I felt disconcerted by the presence of so many tropes and stereotypes, for lack of a better word. There were a few narrative moments that felt relatable but overall it just felt very clear to me that this author not only is not autistic but very likely hasn’t interacted meaningfully with any autistic people. It didn’t take much digging to confirm this suspicion. The animal violence and justification for it was also disturbing in a way that I couldn’t get past because the thought behind it is reminiscent of thought patterns that are so legitimately dangerous but it isn’t acknowledged as such when revealed.

Something I wrote about 10 days ago, the last time I picked up this books was:

I think I might hate this book. It feels rude almost and I don’t like the implication that people with aspbergers are somehow immune to other mental health conditions because of how our brains work. I don’t like the savant angle. I don’t like how unoriginal this boy is. It’s so frustrating to me and it’s making this 6 hour book feel like an eternity

I can see myself revisiting this book eventually because I’m curious about the family but for now I just want to move on from it.

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