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Summary
Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Growing Up
Trust
Truth, Love, and Safety
Logic vs. Emotion
Perspective and the Absurdity of the World
Summary
Analysis
The story opens in Swindon, England, just after midnight, when Christopher discovers Wellington, his neighbor’s dog, lying dead on her lawn with a pitchfork stabbed through him. Christopher pets Wellington, wondering who killed him and why.
This opening positions the novel as a murder mystery, while simultaneously making it clear that the novel won’t be conventional, since the murder victim is a dog. The reader’s first exposure to Christopher as a character shows him as an almost unnervingly calm and rational person in a crisis.
Themes
