April is Autism Acceptance Month which means time for book recommendations!!

Or Autism Awareness Month if you prefer! I personally feel we need both acceptance and awareness. While society has improved its understanding of autism in recent years, there is still a long, long way to go. Especially for media representation for autistics who are people of colour or trans or from a variety of cultures. But it’s definitely nice to see more autism books coming out from actually autistic voices!!

But we still need more autistic books. And we need more support of the autistic books that are published right now, so please remember that buying, reading, and talking about autistic books = tells publishers we want more. Autistic voices are categorically silenced across history, and that needs to change. As an autistic author, I’m super passionate about this and want more of my autistic books published. My second book, The Boy Who Steals Houses, features two autistic brothers (though Sam isn’t labelled on page, he is autistic too!), and okay but I have so many plans for more stories. 😭

So onto the list!!!

This is not an exhaustive list and I haven’t read them all, but I’ve reached out to the autistic community for recommendations too and hopefully this is a list of quality literature and good representation. I’ve been super burned by harmful and poor rep before, so I’m very cautious these days. But this list?! This list has me so very excited.

#Ownvoices autistic authors will be indicated with a ⭐️.

my instagram post of autistic book recs | my twitter thread of community recs

AUTISTIC BOOK RECOMMENDATIONS

2023 AUTISTIC BOOK RELEASES

• TILLY IN TECHNICOLOR by Magzey Eddings — Contemporary YA about two neurodivergent teens who form a connection over the course of a summer. Oliver is autistic. August 15, 2023 | Goodreads
• A PRAYER FOR VENGEANCE by Leanne Schwartz — YA Fantasy about a living statue hunts the autistic boy who woke her. September 19, 2023 | Goodreads ⭐️
• THE SPIRIT BARES ITS TEETH by Andrew Joseph White — YA Horror about an autistic trans boy must escape the cruel finishing school and rotten guts to the world. September 5, 2023 | Goodreads ⭐️
• SOMETHING MORE by by Jackie Khalilieh — Contemporary YA about a Palestinian-Canadian girl trying to hide her autism while navigating high school. June 6, 2023 | Goodreads ⭐️

• THIS IS THE WAY THE WORLD ENDS by Jen Wilde — YA Thriller about an autistic teen surviving a fateful night at an elite private school’s epic masquerade ball. May 9, 2023 | Goodreads ⭐️
• THE LUIS ORTEGA SURVIVAL CLUB by Sonora Reyes — YA contemporary about autistic Ariana Ruiz and an unlikely group of students determined to expose a predator. May 23, 2023 | Goodreads ⭐️
• THE FIRE, THE WATER, AND MAUDIE MCGINN by Sally J. Pla — An autistic teen wrestles with hiding her autism while wildfires strike and she evacuates with her dad. July 11, 2023 | Goodreads
• FREYA HARTE IS NOT A PUZZLE by Méabh Collins — YA contemporary about an autistic teen learning to accept herself despite society’s view of her autism. March 6, 2023 | Goodreads

• IZZY AT THE END OF THE WORLD by K.A. Reynolds — Middle Grade apocalypse story about an autistic girl surviving the end of the world with her loveable dog. February 21, 2023 | Goodreads
• GOOD DIFFERENT by Meg Eden Kuyatt —  Middle Grade novel-in-verse about an autistic girl who comes to understand and celebrate her difference. March 7, 2023 | Goodreads
• VIVI CONWAY AND THE SWORD OF LEGEND by Lizzie Huxley-Jones — Middle Grade fantasy about a girl who pulls Excalibur from a lake and must protect the world from being taken over by an evil king. June 1, 2023 | Goodreads ⭐️
• TELL ME HOW IT ENDS by Quinton Li — Adult fantasy coming-of-age cozy with a queer cast, witches, and tarot, Legends & Lattes and Our Flag Means Death with an autistic main character. April 9, 2023 | Goodreads ⭐️

 

 

AUTISTIC YOUNG ADULT FANTASY

• UNSEELIE by Ivelisse Housman — YA fantasy where twin sisters are on the one, one a rogue, the other an autistic fairy changeling. January 3, 2023 | Goodreads ⭐️
  
• HELL FOLLOWED WITH US by Andrew Joseph White — YA dystopian horror about a trans boy on the run from the cult that raised him and aided by Nick, gorgeous, autistic, and a deadly shot. June 7, 2022 | Goodreads ⭐️
• THE ART OF SAVING THE WORLD by Corinne Duyvis — YA Sci Fi about one girl and her doppelgangers try to stop the end of the world. September 15, 2020 | Goodreads ⭐️
• LORD OF SHADOWS (#2) by Cassandra Clare — Shadowhunters installment with murder mystery and side autistic character with some POV chapters. May 23, 2017 | Goodreads

• THE VENOMOUS TEMPEST by Sebastiaan Constantino van Doorn — YA fantasy where autistic teens start off an apprenticeship with the order of dragon hunters. August 16, 2022 | Goodreads
• TRICK by Cara Cox — Shadowhunters meets Addie Larue where two mysterious strangers tell a college student she can turn back time. Autistic POV. June 1, 2023 | Goodreads

 

 

AUTISTIC YOUNG ADULT CONTEMPORARY

• THE BOY WHO STEALS HOUSES by CG Drews — Aka yours truly!!! A Goldilocks retelling about two autistic house-stealing brothers who find a family. April 4, 2019 | Goodreads ⭐️
• KIDS LIKE US by Hilary Reyl — An autistic boy spends summer in France and learns that he deserves love. November 14, 2017 | Goodreads 
• SOCIAL QUEUE by Kay Kerr — An autistic teen starts an internship with a media company and begins writing about her love life. September 1, 2021 | Goodreads ⭐️
• WHEN MY HEART JOINS THE THOUSAND by A.J. Steiger — An autistic girl falls in love with a a boy with brittle bone disease as they navigate their disabilities together. February 6, 2018 | Goodreads 

• PETA LYRE’S RATING NORMAL by Anna Whateley — Queer autistic/adhd teen must decide which rules to keep, and which rules to break on a ski trip. April 28, 2020 | Goodreads ⭐️
• AFROTISTIC by Kala Allen Omeiza — An autistic teen desperate to make it in the society creates her own group consisting of autistic students. April 2, 2022 | Goodreads ⭐️
• EVEN IF WE BREAK by Marieke Nijkamp — YA contemporary thriller about a group of friends tied together by a game and the deadly weekend that tears them apart, one of the narrators being autistic. September 15, 2020 | Goodreads ⭐️

 

 

AUTISTIC MIDDLE GRADE CONTEMPORARY & FANTASY

• CAN YOU SEE ME by Libby Scott and Rebecca Westscott — Trilogy about an autistic tween starts highschool and it’s also co-written by an actually autistic teen author. May 2, 2019 | Goodreads
• A KIND OF SPARK by Elle McNicoll — An autistic girl campaigns for a memorial when she learns that her small Scottish town used to burn witches simply because they were different. June 4, 2020 | Goodreads
• THE MANY MYSTERIES OF THE FINKEL FAMILY by Sarah Kapit — Two autistic sisters, their detective agency, and life’s most consequential mysteries. March 23, 2021 | Goodreads
• ELLEN OUTSIDE THE LINES by A.J. Sass — An autistic 13yonavigating changing friendships, a school trip, and expanding horizons. March 22, 2022 | Goodreads

• THE SOMEDAY BIRDS by Sally J. Pla — An autistic 12 year old takes a cross-country roadtrip with his rowdy and chaotic family while trying to spot birds that his wounded father wanted to see. January 24, 2017 | Goodreads
• MASTERS AND BEGINNERS by Daley Downing — A family takes over running a warehouse that stores magical artefacts and documents proving, and protecting, the existence of faeries. August 21, 2017 | Goodreads
• DEAR MOTHMAN by Robin Gow — Middle-grade novel in verse about a young trans boy dealing with the loss of his friend by writing to his favourite cryptid. March 21, 2023 | Goodreads
• SPEAK UP by Rebecca Burgess — Middle Grade graphic novel about an autistic girl who finds friendship where she least expects it and learns to express her true self. January 1, 2022 | Goodreads

 

 

AUTISTIC ADULT SPEC FIC

• AN UNKINDNESS OF GHOSTS by Rivers Solomon — Adult Sci Fi where Aster learns there may be a way off the corrupt ship if she’s willing to fight for it. September 18, 2017 | Goodreads
• THE DEATH OF JANE LAWRENCE by Caitlin Starling — Adult gothic horror where mathematical autistic woman marries for convenience and finds her new husband has a darkly haunted estate. October 5, 2021 | Goodreads ⭐️
• MAZARIN BLUES by Al Hess — Adult Queer Sci Fi where the protagonist grapples with ridding himself of intrusive technology vs the morality of hurting his self-aware AI. November 1, 2022 | Goodreads ⭐️
• SEVEN DEVILS by L.R. Lam and Elizabeth May  — Adult Sci Fi about a group of women who possess the knowledge and capabilities to bring the empire to its knees, one of the POV characters is autistic. August 4, 2020 | Goodreads

• LESSER KNOWN MOSNTERS by Rory Michaelson — An adult queer fantasy with found family and monsters and romance, for fans of horror and paranormal. October 31, 2020 | Goodreads ⭐️
• THE REANIMATOR’S HEART by Alice Jorgensen — Adult fantasy with a reluctant autistic necromancer, a man killed before his time, and the crime that brings them together. October 25, 2022 | Goodreads 
• JUNKER SEVEN by Olive J. Kelley — A romantic, queer sci-fi epic about changing the galaxy, one girl at a time with an autistic protagonist. June 13, 2023 | Goodreads ⭐️
• GUARDIANS OF MASKS AND MEMORY by Jessica Mack — A fantasy about an amnesiac lost princess named Maleda finds that she has a life and homeland beyond the desert that is threatened by a curse and an unknown murderer. September 21, 2021 | Goodreads ⭐️

 

 

AUTISTIC ADULT CONTEMPORARY & ROMANCE & POETRY

• ALL THE THINGS WE DON’T TALK ABOUT by Amy Feltman — Adult literary about an autistic father raising his nonbinary teen and the addict mother who crashes in and out of their life. May 24, 2022 | Goodreads
• EXTREMELY LOUD AND INCREDIBLY CLOSE by Jonathan Safran Foer — Adult literary in the wake of 9/11, nine-year-old Oskar goes on a scavenger hunt across New York to try and understand his father’s death. January 1, 2005 | Goodreads
• CARRY THE OCEAN by Heidi Cullinan — Adult M/M duology romance about an autistic man and his boyfriend with severe social anxiety and how they work toward independent living. April 7, 2015 | Goodreads
• THE FLOWERS NEVER REALLY GREW by Jake Graham — Autistic poetry collection with illustrations by an autistic author. July 18, 2021 | Goodreads ⭐️ 

• ACT YOUR AGE, EVE BROWN (#3) by Talia Hibbert — Adult romcom where the flightiest Brown sister crashes into the life of an uptight B&B owner, featuring two autistic protagonists. March 9, 2021 | Goodreads ⭐️
• THE KISS QUOTIENT by Helen Hoang — Adult romcom trilogy where an autistic data entry mathematician hires an escort to teach her how to love and falls for him instead. June 5, 2018 | Goodreads ⭐️
• ALWAYS ONLY YOU by Chloe Liese — Autistic romcom about a nerdy hockey star and his tough coworker who keeps both her soft side and her autism diagnosis to herself. August 4, 2020 | Goodreads ⭐️
• THE SECRET SERVICE OF TEA AND TREASON (#3) by India Holton — Two rival spies must brave pirates, witches, and fake matrimony to save the Queen. April 20, 2023 | Goodreads

 

 

AUTISTIC NONFICTION | ANTHOLOGIES AND MEMOIRS

   

• LOVE & AUTISM by Kay Kerr — Memoir | Goodreads
• UNMASKING AUTISM by Devon Price — Self Help | Goodreads
• STIM ANTHOLOGY edited by Lizzie Huxley-Jones | Goodreads
• AUTISM IN HEELS by Jennifer O’Toole — Memoir | Goodreads

• CHANGELINGS AN AUTISTIC ANTHOLOGY edited by Ryan Vale | Goodreads
• BE DIFFERENT by John Elder Robison — Memoir | Goodreads
• NERDY, SHY, AND SOCIALLY INAPPROPRIATE by Cynthia Kim | Goodreads
• AUTISTIC WORLD DOMINATION by Jolene Stockman — Self Help | Goodreads

 

 

AUTISTIC AUTHORS (CHARACTERS MAYBE NOT AUTISTIC)

• TWELVE by Joan Marie Verba — A fantasy Twelve Dancing Princesses retelling with picturesque romance. August 2, 2022 | Goodreads 
• WORLD RUNNING DOWN by Al Hess — Adult dystopian where a trans salvager risks his own dream in order to give the AI a chance to live theirs. February 14, 2023 | Goodreads 
• A MAGE’S POWER by Casey Wolfe — An M/M Fantasy romance where Rowan and Shaw are entangled in each other’s worlds, it becomes evident that their hearts are as much at risk as their lives. July 16, 2018 | Goodreads
• AGAINST THE STARS by Christopher Hartland — YA Sci Fi queer romance about a teen questioning his sexuality who gets to look into the future with a new technology. April 18, 2023 | Goodreads

Thank you for supporting this post and reading more autistic authors!