I’m looking for books which either focus on or have a realistic depiction of disability; specifically, chronic conditions and invisible disabilities.
I live with Crohn’s Disease and an ileostomy, and I’ve been working myself up to write a book about my experiences for several years now. I haven’t read many books which depict the kinds of things I want to write about. That’s not for a lack of trying, chronic illness is underrepresented in literature and art in general.
The closest I’ve come is:
A Little Life – Hanya Yanagihara (Jude St. Francis)
First Law Trilogy – Joe Abercrombie (Glokta)
The Choice – Dr. Edith Eger
Of course, the first two are rather extreme instances of disability, and are fiction.
The Choice isn’t really disability, but its meditations on recovery I found hugely inspirational and informative for how I’d like to write about learning to cope with illness.
Therefore, I’m open to fiction and non-fiction, though primarily I’d like non-fiction recommendations, as I mainly want books which will help inform my approach to writing my firsthand experiences.
Thanks for taking the time to read, any and all recommendations are appreciated 🙂
by Sad-Bus792
3 Comments
What Doesn’t Kill You by Tessa Miller
I Choose Elena by Lucia Osborne-Crowley
Ask Me About My Uterus by Abby Norman
All’s Well by Mona Awad
In nonfiction, Abby Norman’s *Ask Me About My Uterus: A Quest to Make Doctors Believe in Women’s Pain* about her endometriosis and experiences with the medical establishment is the best thing I’ve read. She does a great job of bringing in wider statistics and tying them into her experience and narrative in a really readable, gripping way.
*Brain on Fire: My Month of Madness* was great too imo, the author has a rare autoimmune condition that attacked her brain and she could not get anyone to believe her, never mind diagnose her. It’s also a great nonfiction read.
As someone else said, in fiction, *All’s Well* buy Mona a while – as someone with a chronic illness I was reading it thinking, “damn, this woman has had some kind of chronic illness.” It’s sort of a revenge fantasy/Shakespeare homage, so maybe not the best guide to you, but it’s incredible. Great read!