Autism in Young Adult Novels

Marilyn Irwin is associate professor emerita in the School of Informatics and Computing at Indiana University, Indianapolis. Her teaching and research interests have been in disabilities and literature for youth. Irwin has chaired and served on the American Library Association’s (ALA) Schneider Family Book Award jury and has held numerous elected and appointed positions within ALA’s Association of Specialized and Cooperative Library Agencies.Annette Y. Goldsmith is lecturer in the University of Washington Information School. She is coauthor of HIV/AIDS in Young Adult Novels: An Annotated Bibliography (Scarecrow, 2010). She has chaired and served on the Association for Library Service to Children Mildred L. Batchelder Award. Rachel Applegate is chair of the Library and Information Science Department in the School of Informatics and Computing at Indiana University, Indianapolis. She is the author of Practical Evaluation Techniques for Librarians (2013) and is an accrediting site visitor and team chair for the Higher Learning Commission and the American Library Association.

• Foreword by Barbara KlipperIntroduction: What Do Young Adult Novels Have to Say about Autism?Part I: Autism in Young Adult Novels1. Autism in Novels for Young Adults2. Who Has Autism?3. Portrayal of the Character with Autism4. Family Life5. Autism in Young Adult Novels, 1968-2013: A SummaryPart II: Annotated BibliographiesAnnotated Bibliography of Novels with Autism Specified, 1968-2013Annotated Bibliography Where Autism Appears to be Present, But Not SpecifiedAppendix A The Role of Autism in the Novel (Central to Plot, Subplot)Appendix B Autism Novels by Literary QualityAppendix C Autism Novels by GenreAppendix D Autism Novels by Year of PublicationAppendix E Autism Novels First Published Outside the United StatesAppendix F Coding SheetsIndexAbout the Authors

With the increase of children and teens diagnosed with an autism spectrum disorder (ASD), there has also been an increase of books on the subject, including fiction. This book looks at 100 novels published in English between 1968 and 2013, for young adults (ages 11 to 19), with at least one main character overtly stated as having an ASD. Each novel was analyzed by the authors using a coding sheet developed for the study, which is included in the appendix. The three parts to the book are an analysis of characters, a section of annotated bibliographies, and a bibliography of novels where a character shows characteristics of having an ASD but it is not clearly stated in the book. In the character analysis, the authors looked for such things as sex, age, whether the character has friends, the relationship with family members, and how accurate the information on ASD is presented. The annotated bibliography includes information such as whether autism is a central plot of the novel, how accurately ASD is described in the novel, and how well written the novel is. This is a unique bibliography of a topical issue, and it belongs in most school and public library professional collections.