I could criticize the focus on “fixing” and of the correlation between unwantedness and disability, but the book is focused on unwantedness in a broader fashion; Ava is as challenged by her circumstances as she is by her clubfoot.
In the time since I first read Wonder, my understanding of my disfigurement, and the world it occupies, has transformed. How will I now read and receive what was the most personally representative book of my life?
I wish this book, featuring a girl newly diagnosed with Crohn’s, had existed when I was a teenager—my recurring thought throughout was, “Oh my god, someone wrote a book for me!”
Wonderstruck is wonderful. It is, to date, the most creative and ambitious novel about the d/Deaf experience in America I’ve ever come across.
When Deenie was first published, it may well have been a positive representation of the experience of a child with scoliosis, but it hasn’t held up well.
Venkatraman creates a fully-formed character, and nails both the details and the emotion of having a limb amputated and adjusting to life afterwards.
The Categorical Universe of Candice Phee is a fun, well-written book, if an imperfect autism read.
Although Kurt’s character seems to largely exist to serve the central romance, I was pleasantly surprised by how many pitfalls Perkins avoided in a wonderfully understated manner. Various assumptions and tropes were casually turned over with a single line here or there.
Although I can’t recommend it wholeheartedly, Louder Than Words features a well researched, realistic portrayal of progressive mutism.
In science-fiction and fantasy, you invariably run into fictional disabilities and allegories. Do these “count” as disability? What makes them work successfully in a book?