I have a new book The Speed of Dark by Elizabeth Moon which is a near-future book about autistics. Her teenage son is autistic. The book is fascinating. When I bought it I carried it around with me and when I wasn't busy (I was very busy at the time) I would read a page or two. But now I am only on page 65 and I have not read much for the last five days.

Normally a book like this would take me two to three hours to read. It is not an extremely long book, but there are new concepts which I do not know. Those always slow me down. It is like reading a nonfiction book for me. I want to make sure I understand the facts before I get lost in them.

I want to read it. The character is fascinating and I am interested.

I do not want to read it. Someone is trying to force a treatment on an autistic who does not want it. I am afraid it will be “Flowers for Algernon” all over, with the man losing his abilities. Or, even worse from the character's viewpoint, Lou will become normal and be unable to function as an autistic. He won't see the patterns which have guided his life. He'll have to learn as an adult all the things we learn as children. I think people should be able to choose whether or not they want to change. In this book the autistic has learned to live in our world as himself. Now they want him to live as someone else.

I like books to be happy-ever after. Normally Moon's are. I am not sure this one will be. Right now I do not have the emotional reserve to read a decimating story. That's why I am not reading new fiction. I don't know what will be sad, what will end happily.