ARC July 2013

Welcome to the July meeting of ARC, the Artful Readers Club.

It's been a crazy month for me with so many projects to get finished. if you haven't seen my PaperArtsy projects then  please scroll down and take a look.

Go to the PAPERARTSY BLOG... and leave a comment with a name suggestion in that post and you could win a huge box of goodies from PaperArtsy.

So onto this months book review..

The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time by Mark Haddon.

I bought this book mainly because of the odd title, and the cheap price. I had no clue what it was about.

It is not just an odd title, but an odd little book. A little sad, a little frustrating and a little funny. It is about a 15yr old boy who has Aspergers. The story takes us on a quest to find the killer of a local dog, though this quickly becomes a back story to the everyday trials and tribulations of living with this syndrome. The bulk of the book focusses on the quite intense behavioural quirks and problems of this boy. Written in a diary style by the boy, the details are a little overwhelming, that is to say the reader is bombarded with information,much of it mathematical. I guess the intention is to give the reader an idea of how even ordinary situations and occurrences are extremely difficult for someone with Aspergers. We are taken through the minutiae of how he deals with anything 'different', mostly this involves doing mathematical equations, all of which are in the book..and I have to say I skipped all of them. Maths holds no interest for me.

The death of the dog is a shocking start to the book, but it is then a little more light-hearted. At this point I imagined it to be an easy to read, but quirky detective story. However it turns darker as the boy's world is turned upside down, and he is thrown into unfamiliar situations. His fear and anxiety is all too apparent on the page. There is no 'happy' ending, and not really any good conclusion to the book, though we do find out who killed the dog.

I am not entirely sure I enjoyed the book, it was certainly a quick read with only 268 pages of large text. I have known people with Aspergers and Autism and recognised so many of the traits, but it was still an insight into the enormous effort needed by the boy just to get through each day.

More than anything I think this book is informative, not in a text book way but certainly enough to introduce you to this syndrome.

So onto my journal page. 

The next pages in my book already had leftover paint on them, so I sponged on some white acrylic to knock back the colours. This gave me a good base to work on with faint traces of a layer underneath.

The boy in my book likes to count red cars, so that was my starting point. Then i added random numbers, as he uses Maths an awful lot. 

On the right side i added some translucent blue paint, and then added stars in white paint. 

and then I completely forgot to take photos...

So my steps were this..

1. I decided the white starts weren't enough so I stamped lots of starts in black, and coloured some of them white. 

2.I drew,cut out and painted a childs rocket, I left  hinge on one side so the rocket would open.

3. I added a key die cut

4. i used a lid to make circles of paint and added facial expressions in each one, this is also in the book.

On the left side, I stamped a rodent all around the edge, as the boy has a pet rat. I then stamped more number for the centre. He carries red paper clips so they went on there too. then I added some silhouette images from the book. A railway sign, an underground sign and Sherlock Holmes.

I  then printed out my review and tucked it into the back of the rocket. 

finally I added the title, which is a quote from the book. Not my best page ever but i kind of like it. I wanted it to have a child-like/primary colours theme going on and I think i achieved that. 

here is where you link up if you are taking part in ARC. leave a link to your review and artwork.