Fiction Books with Autistic Protagonists?

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StarTrekker
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10 May 2016, 1:21 am

I'm on a book hunt, and I wonder if you all might help me. I'm looking for books with autistic protagonists, specifically fiction ones. I've read all the most common ones, like "The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nighttime", "Marcelo in the Real World", "House Rules", and several others, but I'd appreciate any titles you can give me, regardless of genre (if the character is good enough, I'll put up with a plot I may not otherwise be interested in). Thanks friends!


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Skilpadde
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10 May 2016, 3:10 am

There are lots of suggestions in this thread:
viewtopic.php?f=4&t=162321


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10 May 2016, 5:42 am

Wikipedia - List of Fictional Characters on the Autism Spectrum

Subsection on literature


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EzraS
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10 May 2016, 8:09 am

I'm in the process of writing one. It's gonna be awhile before it's finished though.



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10 May 2016, 10:15 am

I have read two: Rain Reign, by Ann M. Martin, which is about a girl and her dog and was very good, and The London Eye Mystery, by Siobhan Dowd which is about a boy whose cousin goes missing. I like Rain Reign better, but the second one was pretty good, too.



redrobin62
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10 May 2016, 11:37 am

I wrote one myself. It's called "Commoner The Vagabond". I just published it this week, too.
https://www.amazon.com/COMMONER-VAGABON ... 1_1&sr=8-1



mikeman7918
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10 May 2016, 12:48 pm

I am going to have to recommend my favorite novel, The Martian. The main character (Mark Watney) is not autistic but the author has confirmed that one of the characters, Rich Purnell, is intended to be on the autism spectrum and the book does a great job at portraying it.

If you have already seen the movie then I would still recommend the book because it's better. The movie leaves out so many things and I could rant about it for ages. Given that you are clearly into science fiction I think you might like it.


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SpaceAgeBushRanger
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10 May 2016, 11:17 pm

If you like fantasy you should try out Clariel by Garth Nix.

The main character is a young girl who is passionate about becoming a medieval park ranger, and her social skills are so poor that her cousin and his girlfriend have to guide her through schoolyard conversations. Autism seems to run through her family, with her mother being an self-involved master goldsmith and her grandfather too busy with his hunting hobby to do his job right. She's blatantly asexual, and her narration at times reads like something you'd read on this forum.

There's nothing in the book's publicity materials about autism, so I'm kinda considering writing to Nix to ask him if he meant the character to come across as autistic.

If you like science fiction, you should know that Stephan Baxter sometimes has side-characters that are autistic. Titan has one, and so does Coalescent.

There's a series of self-published detective novels about an autistic detective called Archie Lemons. I've only read the first book, but I enjoyed it, even if the protagonist was a misogynistic at times.

The fantastic blog Disability in Kidlit has a great list of autism fiction.



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11 May 2016, 1:05 am

Thanks for all the rec's guys, I have some investigating to do! :D


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