let’s talk about disability rep

Hi, it’s me again!!! Not every post this year is Christmassy, I’ve got to confess to you (and this is largely my fault, because I have a couple non-Christmassy things I don’t want to wait till January to share). Onto the post!

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Today is international day of persons with disabilities, and I realised the other day I’ve never actually written a blog post about that before. For the first years of my blog, I wouldn’t wouldn’t say I hid my disability, but it certainly wasn’t common knowledge. Then I started using a walking stick and sort of couldn’t hide it anymore, but still, it wasn’t a part of my identity I felt in any way confident claiming. I’m still an anxious wreck, but I think it’s important to acknowledge how far I’ve come. It’s in my social media bios. It’s not the focus, but it’s mentioned here and there in posts or on social media, and sometimes it does take centre stage.

This would never have happened without disability representation in books. No one has ever written a book about **my** condition as far as I know (it’s obscure, to say the least!) BUT reading about other disabled people made me realise that our stories do in fact deserve to be told. Do I still have a mile-long wishlist of disabled stories I want to see? YOU BET. But now I have a little more hope and faith that they’ll actually enter the world someday (partially because I plan on writing some of them myself, but that’s just between us, dear reader.)

Like I said before, I think, that then enabled me to seek out disabled and chronically ill people online (largely through summoning the courage to use the babe with a mobility aid hashtag, and then browsing through it regularly to search for people who might help me feel just a tiny bit more comfy in my own skin.) That, in turn, has led to me working with a disabled literary magazine and meeting some of my closest pals.

I’ve also just written an Instagram post (I’m Instagram.com/goldenbooksgirl, please follow me if you aren’t!) about being a judge for the Adrien Prize, with an author I fully believe is at the helm of revolutionising disability representation in the UK book industry, who has now set up her own prize to champion other books with disabled characters and also disabled authors. Before 2020, I can barely think of any books about disability (like seriously, I think I could count them on one hand) that didn’t paint us as tragic victims or inspiring little soldiers who exist only to teach able-bodied people life lessons. And then I heard about this book called A Kind of Spark, fell in love with my early copy, and am genuinely convinced we’ve had more authentic and meaningful disabled rep in books ever since It’s been a welcome change.

I’m rephrasing a joke from Instagram here, but whoever said you shouldn’t meet your heroes clearly didn’t understand what it’s like to have a role model like Elle McNicoll. I’m so grateful for her and everything she has done and no doubt will continue to do for the disabled community. Judging this prize with her has been the honour of a literal lifetime, and I can’t wait for everyone to see the shortlist on Monday. Please share it, please comment, please support it. This matters so much and I’d be so invested in it’s success even if I wasn’t personally involved.

Please never underestimate the importance of feeling seen. I wish I’d had that so many years before I did, and now that it’s more plentiful, I plan to savour every single book that lets me have it.

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