Book Review: Funny, You Don’t Look Autistic by Michael McCreary
Good Morning! Here’s my Monday Morning Blog!
Did you know, World Autism Awareness Day was April 2nd and April is Autism Awareness Month? It is a great time to bring awareness about people with Autistic Spectrum Disorder (ASD) including Autism and Asperger syndromes.
While looking into Autism, I found an Autism 101 course on the Autism Society Website that helped me understand it better. Autism is a complex developmental disability affecting individuals in the areas of communication and social interaction. It is a spectrum disorder, meaning symptoms can occur in any combination and with varying degrees of severity. There are many resources available for parents and teachers. Here’s a link to their website Autism Society
In 2020, the Autism Society of America launched its Celebrate Differences campaign to build better awareness of the signs, symptoms and realities of autism. See the Celebrate Differences Pledge below.
What a perfect time to pick this book as the Big Library Read, eh? The Big Library Read, started in June of 2014, is “the first ever global eBook club.” It’s facilitated by OverDrive and is a reading program through your library which connects readers around the world with the same eBook at the same time without any wait lists or holds. There are three reads scheduled for this year, the one for this book being the first. The second one starts towards the end of June and the third one is in November. The website provides marketing materials for your local library to get involved and provide a way to join a discussion with other readers around the world. Be sure to take a look at their website. Big Library Read.
Selma’s Book Review
Book Title Funny, You Don’t Look Autistic
Author Michael McCreary
Type of Book Teen or Young Adult Memoir
Background Michael McCreary was diagnosed with Asperger’s Syndrome at the age of five. His parents enrolled him in the Stand up for Mental Health program at the age of thirteen where he found a positive outlet for his anxiety and met the founder of the program, David Granirer. McCreary trained with Granirer to create his comedy act, “Does This Make My Asperger’s Look Big?”. He was a contributor to the 2015 book published by the Autism Society called Autism: The Gift That Needs to be Opened. Now at the age of twenty-four, he is a self-defined Aspie Comic, a stand-up comedian who uses his love of the theater and being funny to breakdown the misconceptions about Autism Spectrum Disorder.
Summary of the book This memoir is McCreary’s story about growing up on the autism spectrum. Sometimes funny and sometimes sad, McCreary takes us through his day to day life and the challenges he faced being “a little different” from the rest of us.
Reaction to the book I enjoyed the read and found the book to be very informative. I liked how it was more informally written, without a lot of statistics and textbook definitions. As he told this story, we could feel his humor and personality shining through. Engaging read for young readers as McCreary’s story could be very relatable for someone on the autism spectrum. It would be a very insightful read for those of us who aren’t as informed about ASD.
Link to the author If you want to learn more about the author, here is a link to his website Michael McCreary
Link to the book If you want to purchase this book, here is a link to Amazon. Funny, You Don’t Look Autistic
Be sure to tune in to my Facebook page this Thursday, April 16th at 11:00 AM (Central Daylight Time (CDT)) for a live reading of chapter two of The Hard Way. Haven’t read chapter one yet? You can pick it up for free if you sign up for the e-mail list on my website. It will be a pop-up window when you first arrive on the home page. Hope to see you then.
Have a great week!
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