Interview with Heidi Heilig about The Girl from Everywhere
Heidi Heilig and S. Jae-Jones sit down to talk about the book’s portrayal of bipolar disorder, writing mental illness, and writing with a mental illness.
Heidi Heilig and S. Jae-Jones sit down to talk about the book’s portrayal of bipolar disorder, writing mental illness, and writing with a mental illness.
We recap the highlights of our #diklSFF Twitter chat, including a link to the full Storify.
You Look Different in Real Life is a contemporary YA novel in which the broken friendship between the protagonist and her autistic best friend plays a central role–a thoughtfully handled plot thread that we were eager to talk to author Jennifer Castle about.
We take a close look at the state of recognizable representation of visibly disabled characters on book covers.
I wanted to write about a real girl with real emotions struggling in a world that too often is unforgiving to those who don’t fit the right mold.
A poster child, to me, is a child with a disability who is “shown off” as a way to generate funds, awareness, understanding, more funds. Mostly funds, in my experience.
Being autistic and also belonging to another minority might be one marginalization too many to sell children’s fiction informed by one’s own experience to a mainstream press, and that is a very sad thought.
The most common wheelchair-using character has acquired paraplegia, but why is this particular narrative so prevalent, and at the expense of all others?