This study explores the responses of Abby, a young person with autism, to David Macaulay's 1990 picturebook "Black and White." Although both picturebook researchers and autism practitioners focus on the importance of encouraging empathetic responses to fictional characters, I build on Louise Collins' argument that Macaulay's work offers an opportunity to develop a different kind of "moral literacy" (2002, p.31). Different ways of practising and understanding perspective-taking in relation to fiction are considered in light of Abby's responses to "Black and White" and to fiction more generally. This study, in considering its own weaknesses, also offers a critique of the typical approaches to picturebook research whereby taking the perspective of fictional characters is sometimes seen as indicative of reading competence.