Siobhan Dowd.  The London Eye Mystery.  David Fickling Books, 2008.  ["Originally published in Great Britain by David Fickling Books, an imprint of Random House Children's Books, in 2007." -- t.p. verso]  323 pages.  Age 9 to 12.

After the first nine pages, I found that this novel was not gripping me, so I went to bed.  Lying there, I started ruminating about why I was so disinterested in a book that received so many starred reviews.  And a person disappearing from a sealed pod should be interesting.  After about ten minutes I realized that, if I was going to be awake anyway, I might as well be reading.  Page ten hooked me.  It wasn’t the mystery—it was the narrator, Ted.  Specifically, this:

“Being socially excluded is a bit like being excluded from school.  Instead of a head teacher telling you you have to leave, it’s more that everybody in the rest of society acts like you don’t exist.  And you end up with all the other people who are being ignored.  And you’re so angry that society is treating you like this that you take drugs and shoplift and form gangs in revenge.”

Ted takes everything literally.  His hand “shakes itself out” when he’s uncomfortable.  He’s smart, and knows a lot about meteorology.  His approach to problem-solving is to painstakingly analyze all factors involved, including any Coriolis effects.  But it didn’t occur to me until the word “syndrome” started getting thrown around that Ted had any significant impairment.  The text does not offer any official diagnosis, but according to the CIP he has Asperger Syndrome.  Let’s trust the catalogers.

Ted’s airquotes{ syndrome } is what allows him to solve the mystery of the missing cousin.  Sadly, it also causes him to be ignored, especially by his mum, who forms a habit of shooing him away.  The mystery, in and of itself, is slow-going.  The first genuine clue isn’t uncovered until halfway through the novel.  But the mystery isn’t really the heart of the story.  I think it comes down to family relationships, and their durability when exposed to stress.  That, and Ted’s different-operating-system brain (an analogy that was smart the first time, and increasingly annoying when repeated thereafter).

After everything I had to say about Well Witched, I’m happy to report that The London Eye Mystery has suffered no symptoms of Americanization.  This was only occasionally confusing, with words like “lilo” (and I’m happy to report that I’m not the only one who didn’t know that term).  Still, to prove my point, it’s not rocket science.  I knew it had to be either an air mattress or a trundle bed, or something along those lines.  Turns out it’s the former.

Quotable:

Ted had more than one thing figured out:

“I’m not a philosopher.  I’m a meteorologist.  But I believe in meditation.  Buddhists believe that if you empty out your head, that’s when you find enlightenment.  Kicking the shed is a good way of emptying out your head.  It’s like jumping on a trampoline.  You kick or jump, you jump or kick, and eventually all the thoughts march out of your ears, like a line of toy soldiers heading for the edge of the table.  You’re left with nothing—the empty nothing I told Salim about, which is frightening and lonely, but simple and clear.” (pp. 248-249)

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