Task 16: Read an own voices book about disability

[Book Riot]

Use this space to discuss books you're reading or that might fit the 16th Read Harder task.

[Meredith]

My favorite tasks each year are the disability tasks, as I'm a caregiver for an individual with intellectual and physical disabilities and I crave insight into her world.

If you're into gripping memoirs, I highly recommend Ghost Boy: My Miraculous Escape from a Life Locked Inside My Own Body. The author really takes you inside his disability experience.

If you've never really heard from a person considered to have a "moderate" intellectual disability and want to be challenged to see the world from his/her perspective, I highly recommend The Social Meaning of Mental Retardation: Two Life Stories:. Skip the academic parts and just read Ed and Patty's autobiographies! Never seen anything like this in print before!

This year, I'm going to try Being Heumann: An Unrepentant Memoir of a Disability Rights Activist, a newer memoir by one of the disability rights pioneers. Yay, it's available on audio!

[Katie]

For this I am choosing The Silence Between Us since I have always been interested in Deaf culture and want to one day learn ASL.

[Kelsey]

Highly recommend Disability Visibility: First-Person Stories from the Twenty-first Century as an intro to this topic. I also really enjoyed Disfigured: On Fairy Tales, Disability, and Making Space

[Ariel]

For anyone who would be interested in a graphic format, I just finished reading El Deafo and absolutely loved it!

[Stephanie]

Care Work: Dreaming Disability Justice

[Melissa]

Highly, highly recommend Sitting Pretty: The View from My Ordinary Resilient Disabled Body by Rebekah Taussig. Definitely going to be one of my favorites of 2020. Wonderfully written, witty, and thought-provoking. Loved this one so much.

[Gina]

Ditto on highly recommending Disability Visibility: First-Person Stories from the Twenty-first Century and Sitting Pretty: The View from My Ordinary Resilient Disabled Body!

I'm thinking of reading The Pretty One: On Life, Pop Culture, Disability, and Other Reasons to Fall in Love With Me.

[Virginia Reads the World]

Would something like Wintering: How I learned to flourish when life became frozen work? It's about learning about her chronic illness/disability and coming to terms with a "winter" in her life.

[Tanu]

I might read Borderline for this prompt.

[Tri]

Anyone know any books by neurodiverse people that could fit this category? I’m Autistic and really wanting some positive representation.

[Marie]

Tri wrote: "Anyone know any books by neurodiverse people that could fit this category? I’m Autistic and really wanting some positive representation."

I am thinking about reading Queens of Geek by Jen Wilde. The summary doesn't say it outright, but the reviews do say one the main character is on the autism spectrum, and the author indicates she is as well on her Twitter bio.

[Kass]

I'll be reading Meet Me in Outer Space by Melinda Grace. It's about a college student with central auditory processing disorder.

[Jennifer]

I highly recommend Unbroken: 13 Stories Starring Disabled Teens. I do not normally like short stories/anthologies but this one was A+.

[taeli]

@Tri Helen Hoang wrote two romance books w neurodivergent characters

[taeli]

Sorry just realized its supposed to be a book about disability, not just with an author and chars who have.it. Temple.Grandin is.the.big name for own voices autism writing

[Arlene]

Tri wrote: "Anyone know any books by neurodiverse people that could fit this category? I’m Autistic and really wanting some positive representation."
I enjoyed Funny, You Don't Look Autistic: A Comedian's Guide to Life on the Spectrum. It's great on audio.

[Jill]

Tri wrote: "Anyone know any books by neurodiverse people that could fit this category? I’m Autistic and really wanting some positive representation."

Hello, here are some other fiction options:
On the Edge of Gone by Corinne Duyvis (YA SFF with LGBTQ rep)
Failure to Communicate by Kaia Sønderby (SFF with LGBTQ rep)
The State of Grace by Rachael Lucas (YA Contemporary Romance)

[Lindsey]

I’m thinking of Carly Findlay’s book “Say Hello”

[Hector]

If you're going for the bonus prize, Queer Crips: Disabled Gay Men and Their Stories (Haworth Gay & Lesbian Studies) should do. My husband is a below the knee amputee, and I will finally read this book now that I have this challenge.

[[deleted user]]

Gina wrote: "Ditto on highly recommending Disability Visibility: First-Person Stories from the Twenty-first Century and [book:Sitting Pretty: The View from My Ordinary Resilient Disabled Body|52..."

The Pretty One is my choice, too! I'm also reading Disability Visibility for one of my "Around the Year" categories.

[Sarah]

I would highly recommend Places I've Taken My Body: Essays by Molly McCully Brown. Beautiful essays about living with cerebral palsy.

[Simone]

The Reason I Jump: The Inner Voice of a Thirteen-Year-Old Boy with Autism
This one was fantastic

[Bobby]

I'm planning to read The Diving Bell and the Butterfly, by Jean-Dominique Bauby. The Dallas Opera is scheduled to perform an opera based on this book in the spring, although with the way things are going in Texas right now I'm not sure I want to take the risk of attending!

[Megan]

Melissa wrote: "Highly, highly recommend Sitting Pretty: The View from My Ordinary Resilient Disabled Body by Rebekah Taussig. Definitely going to be one of my favorites of 2020. Wonderfully writte..."

Another recommendation for Sitting Pretty. I absolutely loved it this year.

[L Y N N]

Thinking in Pictures: My Life with Autism by Temple Grandin

[Erika]

Megan wrote: "Melissa wrote: "Highly, highly recommend Sitting Pretty: The View from My Ordinary Resilient Disabled Body by Rebekah Taussig. Definitely going to be one of my favorites of 2020. Wo..."

I think this is what I'm going to go with, I just found it in a Google search

[Kari]

I'm thinking Borderline by Mishell Baker--it's an urban fantasy that seems to focus on the protagonist learning to work and live with her borderline personality disorder after a suicide attempt.

[Melissa]

Would So Lucky work here? It's fiction about someone suffering from Multiple Sclerosis, which the author also has.

[Rebecca]

I've chosen Being Heumann: An Unrepentant Memoir of a Disability Rights Activist. Sounds really interesting.

[Tina]

I was thinking about reading this one: Me, Antman & Fleabag

[Elaina]

Strangers Assume My Girlfriend Is My Nurse
I've been following Shane Burcaw's YouTube channel for a while now and am excited to read his book! He and Hannah, his now wife, are such kind and creative people.

[Lacey]

Think I’m going to read The Pretty One by Keah Brown for this challenge. I do have Queen of Geek by Jen Wilde and On the Edge of Gone though so I plan to read both of those sometime.
I’ve read Disability Vvisibility and I definitely agree with the recommenders to read it in order to gain a perspective from disabled people from various backgrounds

[Kristi]

Tri wrote: "Anyone know any books by neurodiverse people that could fit this category? I’m Autistic and really wanting some positive representation."
These two books are on my wishlist since my niece has autism. I came on here to find out if reading about autism would be accepted for this challenge.
Population One: Autism, Adversity, and the Will to Succeed (recommended by Autism Speaks)
The Reason I Jump: The Inner Voice of a Thirteen-Year-Old Boy with Autism

[Graesyn]

Do ya'll think Let's Pretend This Never Happened: A Mostly True Memoir would fulfill this one or should I be looking more Errant Gods (which also qualifies for bad cover, lol)? I have Rheumatoid Arthritis and I'd like something that speaks more to what I have or at least closer to it.

[Erika]

CJ wrote: "Do ya'll think Let's Pretend This Never Happened: A Mostly True Memoir would fulfill this one or should I be looking more Errant Gods (which also qualifies for bad c..."

I think Let's Pretend This Never Happened: A Mostly True Memoir might fit task 23 (Demystifies a common mental illness) better than this one, based on GR tagging it as "mental health"

Errant Gods would fit this one, though! :)

[Book Riot]

Greetings! We have some suggestions for this task up on the site now. https://bookriot.com/read-harder-2021...

[Erika]

Oh man now I have to think. I had initially shelved Sitting Pretty: The View from My Ordinary Resilient Disabled Body for this task, but after reading Book Riot's post, Ask Me About My Uterus: A Quest to Make Doctors Believe in Women's Pain sounds super interesting.

[Rachel]

Book Riot wrote: "Greetings! We have some suggestions for this task up on the site now. https://bookriot.com/read-harder-2021..."

Thanks! This is an area I find really interesting. I was already planning to read Disability Visibility: First-Person Stories from the Twenty-first Century and I've now added Care Work: Dreaming Disability Justice to my list too. I think I'm going to be doubling (or even tripling!) up on a number of categories for this challenge.

[Nancy]

Kari wrote: "I'm thinking Borderline by Mishell Baker--it's an urban fantasy that seems to focus on the protagonist learning to work and live with her borderline personality dis..."

I loved Borderline!

[River]

Hi, I’m seeing a few recommendations for Borderline here, which is great as a read in general but as someone that lives with BPD, I would like to point out that it’s not a disability, it’s a mental illness.

[Mao]

Does the book "When the Phone Rings, My Bed Shakes" by Philip Zavove fit in this task?

[Dineen]

I read Count Us In, by two young men (at the time they wrote the book) with Down Syndrome. I really enjoyed hearing their perspectives on life.

[Lαυɾҽɳ]

I'm wondering if Tell Me Everything You Don't Remember: The Stroke That Changed My Life would be a good fit for this prompt?

[Nancy]

Nicole wrote: "Hi, I’m seeing a few recommendations for Borderline here, which is great as a read in general but as someone that lives with BPD, I would like to point out that it’s not a disability, it’s a mental..."

Good point. I think it would work for prompt #23 (a book that demystifies a common mental illness).

[Laura Cort]

I think that some people would consider BPD a disability. In the UK a disability can be defined as a chronic mental illness if it has severe detrimental effects on your every day living. I am also writing this as someone with BPD. However, it is very much up to an individual that has this condition, whether they define it as a disability for themselves or not

[Donya]

I would recommendPrognosis: A Memoir of My Brain She suffers a TBI after a fall from a horse. This is how she has to learn to live and deal with it and also features lesbian love. It could also fulfill prompt 23 as she suffers from depression and anxiety after her injury.

[Yrinsyde]

Illness and disability are different. You can be disabled by illness, that is true. But I wouldn't say it is a disability as such. I would think about sensory disabilities such as blindness or low vision, physical such as paraplegia or lacking/having malformed limbs, and mental, such as intellectual disability or dyslexia. I would not include mental illness in this category. Myself, I am hearing impaired (disability) and also have renal failure (illness).

[Yrinsyde]

Ok, I stand corrected! I checked the Medical Subject Headings and the definition is: Disabled Persons - general or unspecified; prefer specifics; includes both physical and mental disability; emotionally disabled = MENTAL DISORDERS Check out this URL for a breakdown of different types of Disabled Persons (scroll down to the highlighted term).

[tif]

Nicole wrote: "Hi, I’m seeing a few recommendations for Borderline here, which is great as a read in general but as someone that lives with BPD, I would like to point out that it’s not a disability, it’s a mental..."

Hi Nicole and others commenting on this issue. Some people may consider a mental illness to be a psychosocial disability if it has a profound enough effect on their life and creates social disadvantage or presents barriers to their equality with others.