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'Speed of Dark' by Elizabeth Moon
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katlinel for lending this to me. (By happy coincidence, Henry phoned me while I was half way though it and told me he'd just found a copy in a charity shop - he knows how much I like Elizabeth Moon's writing.) Thanks also to auntygillian for introducing me to Moon's writing in the first place.
This is an extremely well-written, but slightly disconcerting book. The writer's research shows - by coincidence, I'd read an article in New Scientist on autism only a week before reading this and things were chiming all the way, especially with regard to coping with sensory overload.
Lou is an autistic. A high-functioning autistic who was helped by techniques developed while he was young. He's a genius at spotting patterns, whether they be in numeric data or in the moves of a fencing match. However, he has serious difficulty in understanding people. We slowly come to realise that he has been taught to mimic 'normal' behaviour. He knows what many of the rules are - when someone asks how you are, the correct answer is 'OK', but we realise that he doesn't know why this is the correct answer.
He's confused when asked multiple questions; which order is he supposed to answer them in?
He's marked down on IQ tests because he sees connections between items that are not the ones most people would choose.
He's falling in love, but doesn't know what the rules are to ask a woman to dinner.
His life is all pattern, routine and repetition.
His life is pushed out of kilter when his new boss decides that he wants the autistics in his office to take a new (and unproven treatment) - and tells them they will lose their jobs if they refuse.
Lou learns a lot about himself while trying to decide whether to take the treatment, and we learn a lot about him.
Towards the end, I suddenly realised why the book is mostly written in the present tense. We do not know who Lou will be by the end of the book. It's unsettling (and deliberately so).
Anyone who has read 'Flowers for Algernon' will understand the feeling exactly.
I won't say how the book ends, but I do recommend reading it.
(The book would have benefited from better proof-reading. My copy had two obvious typos and a point where the wrong tense was used - the tense change was particularly annoying as I assumed at first that the writer was trying to convey a subtle point by having Lou use the past tense when narrating)
katlinel for lending this to me. (By happy coincidence, Henry phoned me while I was half way though it and told me he'd just found a copy in a charity shop - he knows how much I like Elizabeth Moon's writing.) Thanks also to auntygillian for introducing me to Moon's writing in the first place.This is an extremely well-written, but slightly disconcerting book. The writer's research shows - by coincidence, I'd read an article in New Scientist on autism only a week before reading this and things were chiming all the way, especially with regard to coping with sensory overload.
Lou is an autistic. A high-functioning autistic who was helped by techniques developed while he was young. He's a genius at spotting patterns, whether they be in numeric data or in the moves of a fencing match. However, he has serious difficulty in understanding people. We slowly come to realise that he has been taught to mimic 'normal' behaviour. He knows what many of the rules are - when someone asks how you are, the correct answer is 'OK', but we realise that he doesn't know why this is the correct answer.
He's confused when asked multiple questions; which order is he supposed to answer them in?
He's marked down on IQ tests because he sees connections between items that are not the ones most people would choose.
He's falling in love, but doesn't know what the rules are to ask a woman to dinner.
His life is all pattern, routine and repetition.
His life is pushed out of kilter when his new boss decides that he wants the autistics in his office to take a new (and unproven treatment) - and tells them they will lose their jobs if they refuse.
Lou learns a lot about himself while trying to decide whether to take the treatment, and we learn a lot about him.
Towards the end, I suddenly realised why the book is mostly written in the present tense. We do not know who Lou will be by the end of the book. It's unsettling (and deliberately so).
Anyone who has read 'Flowers for Algernon' will understand the feeling exactly.
I won't say how the book ends, but I do recommend reading it.
(The book would have benefited from better proof-reading. My copy had two obvious typos and a point where the wrong tense was used - the tense change was particularly annoying as I assumed at first that the writer was trying to convey a subtle point by having Lou use the past tense when narrating)
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May I commend "mustn't grumble".
* Explicit nod to social convention
* Whilst simultaneously subverting it
* Hint of heroic British stiff upper lip
* Invitation to engage in Northern subcultural glumfest
* Feeds autistic-spectrum compulsion for truth-telling
* Delectable logical paradox, cf. "this statement is false"
(Hope this digression hasn't spoiled your nice book review!)
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It is written from the point of view of an autistic boy - and reveals more about ourselves...
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last copy Amazon have...
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Yes, they make excellent companion works by exploring autism in different ways.
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off topic
Re: off topic
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It took me a long time to adjust to the fact that everything I took for granted in terms of social interaction - e.g body language, facial expressions, non-literal language etc - he couldn't grasp. Instead he was very good at faking what he'd been told was the correct reaction.
I also found a book online that gave me a really good insight into how my colleague might be viewing the world. I found it a real eye-opener: http://www-users.cs.york.ac.uk/~alistair/survival/