Fascinating! "The Speed of Dark" is the story of Lou Arrendale, an autistic man. The story is set in the very near future, a time when a cure for autism exists if it is detected early, in infancy. Lou was already older when the cure was developed, but he did benefit from very good learning tools developed for autists that allowed him to develop very good language skills. He works for a pharmaceutical company, in a team of people like himself who, due to their autism, are better than "normal" people at detecting patterns, and they work as computer scientists. He has is own apartment and car, but is still different from other people, and struggles at times with how different "normal" people are from him, and how hard they can be to understand. The story is told from Lou's viewpoint, and it really gives a rare view into the mind of an autistic person. I came away feeling that "normalcy" and autism are all on a continuum, that some of the things each of us do are very similar to what an autistic person does in both action/perception and also degree. The author has an autistic son, so is definitely writing from a position of intimate knowledge and love. Lou becomes one of those very likeable and unforgettable characters.
