In A Curious Case of A Dog in The Dog in The Night time by Mark Haddon, the author displays Christopher's in ability to understand human emotions. He is unable to understand normal human practices of courtesy and is extremely blunt in his judgment of what people say and do in times of grief: "And sometimes, when someone has died, like Mother died, people say, "What would you want to say to your mother if she was here now?" or "What would your mother think about that?" Which is stupid because Mother is dead and you can't say anything to people who are dead and dead people can't think." (79) A person who didn't have autism would understand the courtesy aspect, however Christopher is unempathetic and doesn't even understand the concept in his own situation of grief and mourning.