Readers looking for autobiographical writings by persons living with disabilities could start with The Story of My Life by Helen Keller and pick out other titles from the same shelf in the public library. Books by parents of differently-abled children may also be of interest, such as Karen and With Love from Karen by Marie Killilea. This author in particular describes home life with all her children, not just Karen.

A tendency may be noticed in these books for the differently-abled person to be an intellectual genius. It can take the powers of a genius to communicate in spite of speech and motor impediments, but this is not always so. Some of the books written since 1990 have been written by people who are of average or moderate intelligence; some have been written by the parents of children who are mentally disabled or have never...