The title got truncated as it's too long, so here it is again:
Connecting with the Autism Spectrum: How to Talk, How to Listen, and Why you Shouldn't Call it High-Functioning
Chapter 1: Understanding the Autism Spectrum
Chapter 2: Neurodiversity, Ableism, and Society
Chapter 3: Communication Breakdown
Chapter 4: Autism at School
Chapter 5: Autism at Work
Chapter 6: Autism in Social Relationships
The book is written with the intent of helping friends, family, and colleagues better understand those on the spectrum. It's also useful for those on the spectrum as well, to understand and explain things in plain language. It's very casual and conversational, and provides a high level overview of a lot of different things, with a number of illustrations from his own life.
He introduces some points I haven't seen in other books thus far, for example, in his section on plain language, he advises on caution with homophones, as they can be a potential source of misunderstanding.
I also appreciate that he takes a moderate approach to things, pointing out both pros and cons with the concept of neurodiversity, and noting that he has done work with Autism Speaks as while he recognizes that while their origins are not very autistic friendly, that they are trying to change.
One last thing I want to note is that the author is part of the small subset of autistics who thinks in pictures and has photographic memory, and so his stories provide an interesting glimpse into how that affected his school life.
Rating: 5.0/5.0
