Review #40
Of the memoirs (including anthologies) I’d read, the vast majority are written by autistic persons, and a small number by autistic parents (some of whom are also autistic themselves).
This book seemed interesting to me because it’s written by a sibling of an autistic. Also, it’s a local book / story, and I’m always interested in those, and so here we go for my 40th autistic book review.
Claire starts with a story of how her brother Ray would, as a child, often observe that a lot of what passes for social convention doesn’t necessarily make sense, and that he felt as if he was from another planet. And that she promised that she’d find what that planet was.
The stories presented are approximately chronological, but sometimes break off where it may make sense to introduce additional context or continue along a certain theme, and so is similar to some other memoirs that follow this flowing story format, such as
Unforgiving: Memoir of an Asperger Teen which is from another local writer.
The author’s care in presenting the story is evident – she takes care to show us not only what she saw, experienced, and thought, but also Ray’s view of things, and sometimes also the opinions and thoughts of family, friends, and neighbours.
Something of interest is that she notes that her brother Ray, when he is writing, is quite articulate and expressive, and quite different from the one who often makes gaffes when speaking and interacting with others in person, and it is the addition of his written thoughts on his experiences that make this book a rare dual memoir, where we can see Ray and Claire’s experiences of the same events.
Claire has shown her compassion and desire to learn about Ray, and to try to help him, and her own journey into accepting him for who he is, and that in his own way, he has left an impact on the world despite challenges that lead him into a career that may not have made the best of his abilities, and was unfortunately cut short.
While I live a rather different life than Ray, I was often touched by shared challenges, and appreciated this book and its intimate dive into some of Ray’s faux pas and Claire and Ray’s analysis of them. Some of my takeaways include how much of an impact certain events can have on one’s life trajectory, and how without sufficient guidance and support, that we may not find the best potential for our skills and experiences. But yet, we are not defined by our jobs, titles, degrees or anything else. As individuals, we can all contribute to the world in our own way, and that doing our best each day to care for and share with others, we can all contribute to making the world a better place.
Until now, the highest rating I’ve given to a memoir is 5.5. This book has a lot going for it – unusual perspective (sibling of
and an older autistic), but also from a storytelling perspective is very well crafted, and the discussions and analyses in it are rather insightful. As such, I will give it a higher rating.
Rating: 5.75/6.0 with commendation
