Fiction about People with Disabilities

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Fiction about People with Disabilities

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Despite This Flesh: The Disabled in Stories and Poems Edited by Vassar Miller 810.8 D468: Stories and poems portray the experiences of handicapped people and their families and show how the handicapped are treated by society at large.
With Wings: An Anthology of Literature By and About Women With Disabilities edited by Marsha Saxton and Florence Howe 810.8 W772: Fiction, poetry, and personal accounts explore the strengths and talents of disabled women and girls.

Novels

Alexander, Bruce Blind Justice (p): The legendary--and blind--eighteenth-century judge, Sir John Fielding, cofounder of London's first police force, debuts in the case of a lord whose apparent suicide is exposed as a fountainhead of deception, greed, and murder.
Bender, Karen Like Normal People (m): This auspicious and critically acclaimed first novel follows Lena, a forty-five-year-old woman who is trapped in childish behaviors, as she searches for a normal life, and her widowed mother, Ella, who relives her own dreams and disappointments while confronting the possibility of letting her daughter go.
Brown, Rosellen Tender Mercies (p): The twelve-year-long, happy marriage of Laura and Dan is severely tested when Laura becomes paralyzed as a result of a boating accident for which Dan is responsible.
Cusk, Rachel The Country Life (p): Stella Benson, anxious to leave London and begin a new life, journeys to rural Sussex to work as an au pair for a decidedly overwhelming family, leading to questions about the true motivations for her extreme actions.
Deaver, Jeff A Maiden's Grave (p): When a pathological escaped convict takes a group of deaf girls hostage in a slaughterhouse, an FBI negotiator and a deaf teacher struggle to defuse the situation before it explodes in violence.
Groom, Winston Forrest Gump: A Novel (m): The life of an endearing idiot savant is marked by encounters with some of the most famous figures of the twentieth century.
Hecht, Daniel Skull Session (m): Paul Skoglund, who suffers from Tourette's syndrome, is hired by his wealthy aunt to fix up her ravaged house, but with the help of his girlfriend Lia and Morgan Ford, a police investigator, he uncovers links between the house and a series of brutal crimes.
Hugo, Victor The Hunchback of Notre Dame (p): An alchemist's effort to abduct a beautiful gypsy girl leads to her execution and a futile rescue by the hunchback Quasimodo.
Keyes, Daniel Flowers for Algernon (m): A thirty-two-year-old mentally handicapped man takes part in an innovative scientific experiment to raise his intelligence.
Land, Jon Hope Mountain (p): After his accident, champion skier Jamie Brooks falls into a depression where he loses everything in the world of importance to him, but on the brink of giving up, he finds himself going back to Hope Mountain where the ski school for the disabled changes his entire outlook.
Lott, Brett Jewel: A Novel (m): A mother fights for the dignity of her youngest daughter against the backdrop of a pure and simple way of life in the backwoods of Mississippi in 1943.
Major, Devorah An Open Weave (m): Examines the way in which three generations of women in an African American family come together, centering around Ernestine, the blind grandmother, who weaves the cloths and patterns that fill their house.
Mantel, Hilary Every Day is Mother's Day (m): American readers know English writer Mantel as the author of The Giant, O'Brien, A Place of Greater Safety and other critically hailed novels. This work, a twisted romp through the lives of long-time widow Evelyn Axon and her mentally handicapped middle-aged daughter, Muriel, was her debut novel, originally published in the U.K. in 1985.
Mayerson, Evelyn Wilde Sanjo (m): Sensitive novel about a young woman with Down's Syndrome.
Plain, Belva Daybreak (p): Eighteen years after the fact, two Southern families discover that their sons were switched at birth, and one boy is now fatally ill.
Woods, Stuart Dead Eyes (p): Actress Chris Callaway finds her life threatened by a stalker whose attack leaves her blind, and it is up to Beverly Hills police detective Jon Larsen and Danny Devere, a gay friend, to track the would-be killer.

(P) - physically challenged
(M) - mentally challenged

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