Mark Haddon

I think prime numbers are like life. They are very logical but you could never work out the rules, even if you spent all your time thinking about them.

I find people confusing.

people do a lot of talking without using any words. Siobhan says that if you raise one eyebrow it can mean lots of different things. It can mean “I want to do sex with you” and it can also mean “I think that what you just said was very stupid.”

Mr. Jeavons said that I was a very clever boy.
I said that I wasn't clever. I was just noticing how things were, and that wasn't clever. That was just being observant.

The next day I saw 4 yellow cars in a row on the way to school, which made it a Black Day, so I didn't eat anything at lunch and I sat in the corner of the room all day and read my A-level maths course book.

And all I could see would be stars. And stars are the places where the molecules that life is made of were constructed billions of years ago. For example, all the iron in your blood which stops you from being anemic was made in a star.

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Sherlock Holmes had, in a very remarkable degree, the power of detaching his mind at will.

And this is why I am very good at playing chess, because I detach my mind at will and concentrate on the board and after a while the person I am playing will stop concentrating and start scratching their nose, or staring out of the window, and then they will make a mistake and I will win.

But Father was a more levelheaded person