The most recommended books about people with disabilities

Found at the Festilitt annual secondhand booksale in Parisot, France.

Any Donna Leon book is irresistible to me. I know I will enjoy inhabiting those Venetian streets and cafes with her Inspector Brunetti; dining with his family, including his wife, who is an expert on Henry James; hearing more about his colleagues (good and bad) at the police station.

Like Peters’ Cadfael series or Jane Austen’s novels, Leon works on a little piece of ivory – a constrained world and community that the reader can step into. Once there, with Inspector Brunetti, we must puzzle out another well-crafted mystery that evidences both the cruelties and the kindnesses of the human heart.

12-year-old Catherine’s feelings toward her younger, autistic brother are complicated. She’s protective of him and also appears to be embarrassed by his behaviour. All she wants is a “normal” life. When she becomes friends with a paraplegic boy she’s forced to think about what “normal” really means. This book is hopeful, humourous, thoughtful, and explores what it means to interact with someone who is neurodivergent. The author is the mother of a child with autism and the complex relationships and friendships in the book felt real and captured the mixed-up emotions of middle-graders. 

As a student at San Francisco State University, I took Paul Longmore’s HIST 490 “Disability in America” course and it quite simply changed how I interpret United States history. The autobiographical title essay in Why I Burned My Book presents foundational logic for understanding legal and cultural barriers impacting the disabled, and how capitalism impacts minority groups. Nobody speaks better on disability than the disabled. Longmore creates a model built upon the work of earlier disability scholars-activist in presenting “Catch-22” paradigms in oppressive laws related to race and gender impacting minority groups. When I read Longmore’s ideas, I can again look into his insightful eyes flashing sparks of humor, defiance, anger, and joy. My book about Helen Keller simply would not exist without Longmore’s passionate investment in students.

Black Disability Politics also just came out in early Fall 2022, and I was very excited to receive my print copy. The book shows how Black people have long engaged with disability as a political issue tightly tied to race and racism. This, however, has not been the story told in disability studies or in mainstream histories of the Disability Rights movement. Schalk deeply explores archives (for instance those of the Black Panther Party) and layers these findings across interviews with contemporary Black disabled community organizers, to recognize the richness and power of Black disability politics. This book is full of surprises, memorable archival anecdotes, and powerful conversations between Schalk and others. You should read this book! If a goal within ableist and white supremacist society is liberation, Schalk shows how essential it is to engage in antiracist, feminist, and anti-ableist political and cultural coalition.

Two African American brothers spend their summer in rural Virginia while their parents navigate a rough patch in their marriage. Genie, 11, and Ernie, 13, get to know their blind grandfather who has a special room filled with plants and songbirds. I identified with Genie, a worrier who likes to pose questions in his notebook. As the two brothers respond differently to their grandfather’s announcement that a brave man learns to shoot a gun at 14, Reynolds is also asking readers to consider what it means to be brave and how we should define family. I loved the themes and vivid setting of the book. As someone who visited a grandparent in a small, rural town each summer, I identified with the boys’ sense that they have travelled not just a state but a whole world away from home.

I’ve had an easy life in so many ways, so I appreciate learning from people whose childhood adversities shaped them to make positive changes in the world. When Emmanuel was born in Ghana with a deformed leg, his future looked bleak. Some considered him “cursed.” His mother encouraged him to dream big and become independent. He refused to be defined by his disability and ended up showing “that being disabled does not mean being unable.” To bring attention to the difficulties disabled people face Emmanuel organized and completed a 400-mile bike ride across Ghana. 

I love this book because Emmanuel’s mother believed he was more than his disability, and the way Emmanuel proved this to be true prompted the Ghanaian Parliament to pass the Persons with Disability Act. 

Stevie Wonder’s artistry inspired Quincy Troupe to write a poem about his life and songs, about what he believed in, and how he influenced others.

Stevie was born prematurely and placed in an incubator with extra oxygen in the air. The extra oxygen was helpful for his developing lungs, but it damaged his eyes, blinding him. He discovered his love of music early. His family and neighbors recognized his talent and told others.

Motown released his first album when he was 12. His sense of love and joy has influenced the world. This book is both a tribute and a work of art in itself.

Izzy is a nice girl. She’s pretty, popular, and smart. But one ride with a drunk driver changes her entire life. With one leg amputated, she must embrace a new life and find new friends who see her as more than a girl with a handicap. I liked Izzy so much, and it was thrilling to see her believably move on with her life. I see disabled young people with different eyes since reading Izzy’s story.

This is an anthology for teens that explores disability from a fictional lens, so that it entertains as it teaches tolerance and compassion. Each short story’s author lives with a disability and writes about first loves, friendship, hardship, and adventure. Unbroken is for teen readers to step into the shoes of teens with disabilities so that they can understand other experiences besides their own. Understanding differences and recognizing one’s own positionality and privilege helps teen find their own agency, purpose, and empowered hope for the future. 

In ​Look Up! by Jung Jin Ho the reader slowly comes to understand that the main character is a child sitting on a small balcony outside a tall building in a wheelchair. This child is lonely and isolated. The reader can feel the angry emotion coming off the pages as the child feels frustrated that no one sees them. Everyone on the streets below goes about their day and never notices the child even when she pleads, “Look up!” Jin-Ho uses a black and white color scheme and a combination of lines and objects to evoke melancholy emotions… until the last page when color is used to show happiness, contentedness, and relief. Someone has finally “looked up” and seen more than a wheelchair