The Curious Incident Of The Dog In The Night-Time

Essay Question: Does the novel end on an optimistic note? Explain why. In the book “the curious incident of the dog in the night-time” By Mark Haddon, the new incident of a murder of a dog, Wellington, is introduced in the first chapter. Christopher, a boy diagnosed with Asperger’s Syndrome, who lives next door, seeks to solve the mystery which has befallen on his neighbour’s pet dog. However, as he ventures out to find the murderer, he finds out another mystery which involves his mother who he had thought was dead. In the end, as Christopher finds out about his mother’s existence and his father’s relation to the death of the dog, he starts to feel insecure and makes an extraordinary trip to meet his mother. Eventually, he slowly starts to gain trust in his father once again and the mysteries are solved. However, does the novel end on
I believe that it does. Although the real world is much more different than what he expects, Christopher has started to step out of his comfort zone and has made steps towards independence by overcoming many of his fears. All the mysteries are also solved and Christopher gets to meet his mother and is slowly reconciling with his father. He also does well for his A level exams and his new pet, Sandy is much more interactive compared to his previous pet rat, Toby. In the beginning of the novel, Christopher has been extremely eager to solve the mystery of Wellington’s murder. We see this by him going against his father’s instructions and starting to interact with his neighbours in order to find clues to the murder case. Although he wants to solve the mystery, he also tries to find other ways or excuses of doing so, just so that he would