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Dramatic Irony
Chapter 107
Explanation and Analysis:
The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time is an unconventional take on the classic whodunit/detective story. Christopher himself highlights the important elements of a good mystery story in Chapter 107, using The Hound of the Baskervilles as a template:
I like The Hound of the Baskervilles because it is a detective story, which means that there are clues and Red Herrings. These are some of the clues
1. Two of Sir Henry Baskerville's boots go missing when he is staying at a hotel in London.
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2. Stapleton is the only person who knows how to get through the Grimpen Mire and he tells Watson to stay out of it for his own safety.
These same elements appear in The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time, albeit reframed and reimagined. Halfway through the narrative, Haddon ironically reveals that Christopher's father killed the dog; in the lead-up to this revelation, Haddon includes several false flags/red herrings in the narrative. For example: one might plausibly assume, as Christopher does, that Mr. Shears hates his wife and therefore has motive to kill her dog. Mr. Shears is, however, a "Red Herring"—a man with motive and means, but not the only possible culprit, as Christopher assumes. Haddon also leaves clues in the narrative: early on in his deductive process, Christopher recounts that perpetrators are intimately known by their victims roughly 95% of the time. This commentary foreshadows the fact that Ed Boone is responsible, combined with the revelation that Mr. Shears and Judy Boone had an affair.
