Adult Fiction With Disability Representation

Spotswood, Stephen

Willowjean "Will" Parker is a circus runaway whose knife-throwing skills have just saved the life of private investigator, Lillian Pentecost. Lillian's multiple sclerosis means she can't keep up with her old case load alone, so she wants to hire Will to be her right-hand woman.

Hibbert, Talia

Chloe Brown is a chronically ill computer geek with a goal, a plan, and a list. She's come up with seven directives to help her "Get a Life".

Picoult, Jodi

Struggling to care for their daughter Willow, who was born with brittle bone disease, Charlotte and Sean O'Keefe add additional strain to their overburdened family life when they file a lawsuit against Charlotte's obstetrician.

Leitch, Will

Daniel leads a rich life in the university town of Athens, Georgia. He's got a couple close friends, a steady paycheck working for a regional airline, and of course, for a few glorious days each Fall, college football tailgates. He considers himself to be a mostly lucky guy - despite the fact that he's suffered from a debilitating disease since he was a small child, one that has left him unable to speak or to move without a wheelchair.

Frankel, Laurie

Everyone knows everyone in the tiny town of Bourne, but the Mitchell triplets are especially beloved. Mirabel is the smartest person anyone knows, and no one doubts it just because she can’t speak. Monday is the town’s purveyor of books now that the library’s closed, but Mab’s job is hardest of all: get good grades, get into college, get out of Bourne. Three unforgettable narrators join together here to tell a spellbinding story with wit, wonder, and deep affection.

Griffith, Nicola

So Lucky is the profoundly personal and emphatically political story of a confident woman forced to confront an unnerving new reality when in the space of a single week her wife leaves her and she is diagnosed with multiple sclerosis.

Haddon, Mark

Despite his overwhelming fear of interacting with people, Christopher, a mathematically-gifted, autistic fifteen-year-old boy, decides to investigate the murder of a neighbor's dog and uncovers secret information about his mother.

Evison, Jonathan

After losing virtually everything meaningful in his life, Benjamin trains to be a caregiver, but his first client, a fiercely independent teen with muscular dystrophy, gives him more than he bargained for and soon the two embark on a road trip to visit the boy's ailing father.

Simon, Rachel

It is 1968. Lynnie, a young white woman with a developmental disability, and Homan, an African American deaf man, are locked away in an institution. Deeply in love, they escape, and find refuge in the farmhouse of Martha, a retired schoolteacher and widow. But the couple is not alone, Lynnie has just given birth to a baby girl.

Zevin, Gabrielle

Spanning thirty years, from Cambridge, Massachusetts, to Venice Beach, California, Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow is a dazzling and intricately imagined novel that examines the multifarious nature of identity, games as art form, technology and the human experience, disability, failure, the redemptive possibilities in play, and above all, our need to connect: to be loved and to love.

Nović, Sara

True biz? The students at the River Valley School for the Deaf just want to hook up, pass their history final, and have doctors, politicians, and their parents stop telling them what to do with their bodies. Absorbing and assured, idiosyncratic and relatable, this is an unforgettable journey into the Deaf community and a universal celebration of human connection.