These memoirs and essay collections celebrate disabled bodies, combat ableism, call for disability justice, and describe the myriad ways disabled folk live in and contribute to this world.
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Read this: Credit: vikingbooks I can't remember the last time I read a book as captivating as Ashley Audrain's The Push. It's the kind of book that has you sit you down for one chapter and then suddenly it's hours later and you're hunched in the same position and you realize you're just a few pages from the end. Written as a long letter from our narrator, Blythe, to her ex-husband, Fox, it begins with Blythe's sort of mission statement: She's writing this so he can see her "side of the story."
And what a story it is. Blythe describes getting pregnant with their first child, and her growing fear that she won't be a good mother. Her own mother — who abandoned her as a child — warned her that the women she comes from are "different." And when their little girl, Violet, is born, Blythe is haunted by a sense of alienation from her. She's convinced something is wrong with Violet, who seems to reveal hints of cruelty and manipulation only to her mother; eventually Blythe is convinced she might even be capable of murder. Fox, who adores Violet, insists it's all in Blythe's head. And when their son, Sam, is born, everything finally seems to fall into place. Blythe and Sam immediately connect in the way Blythe imagines a mother and child are supposed to, and the family is happy together for the first time — until, in one devastating moment that Blythe will relive for decades to come, everything comes crashing down.
Interwoven throughout Blythe's letter is a third person account of the abuse, neglect, and tragedy that plagues Blythe's lineage — from her childhood back to her grandmother's formative heartbreak. It's a gripping, profound exploration of motherhood and trauma; and an unsettling, visceral portrayal of a person made to doubt the reality of her own experiences. Get your copy. —Arianna Rebolini
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