Liane Willey

The main character of Pretending to be Normal, Liane Willey suffers from Asperger's Syndrome. The book takes the reader from Willey's childhood struggles with Asperger's all the way through her discovery of her disorder in herself and her daughter and her attempts to cope with the disease as an individual and parent. As a child, Willey was thought to be merely intelligent and stubborn. She often threw tantrums, had poor social skills, and disliked other people. Instead, she preferred to be alone, following her structured routines and displaying a serious affinity for the surfaces and textures of objects.

As a teenager, Willey found it easier to handle social life because of how much regularity and conformity there is in high school. She knew the social scripts and her friends permitted her to act on her eccentric tendencies. However, when Wiley went to college, she lost her safety...