She doesn't want to not be autistic, because it's part of what makes her Tally, and I completely connect with that from my own different experiences. This book is so incredibly well written, and shows the reader so much of the autistic experience in a way I haven't ever seen before. they make her feel like she is clinging to the side of a cliff while her friends all peel her fingers off the edge, one at a time. I am forever grateful that my parents didn't give up and accept my situation the way it was, and put unimaginable amounts of effort into helping my life change. In my experience, discovering food and chemical sensitivities and changing my exposures changed my life, and I would hate for parents or children who are dealing with behavior issues like mine to read this and think that it's a static, unchanging issue that can't be mitigated or resolved.

Importantly, the book also includes the fact that this is just one child's experiences - it won't be the same for every child with autism but it provides a fascinating insight which can help teachers and adults immensely to support children in similar situations. Based on my life experience, I have a hard time with the message that someone has to accept everything about their condition as inevitable and unchanging.They seem to expect Tally to be and act like them and that is something that Tally isn’t comfortable with. I picked this up thinking it would be an insightful read as my 11 year old, with autism, starts high school next month.

But as Tally hides her true self, she starts to wonder what "normal" means after all and whether fitting in is really what matters most. At home, Tally daily has melt-downs in which she screams at her parents and her sister, tells them she hates them, and that her behavior is all their fault, and that she can't help it. The book's descriptions of her feelings, and her explanations for things that don't make sense to other people, are near-perfect. When she starts her new school, everything is very big and overwhelming and she has to find ways to hide her autism, but what if she doesn't have to? I was terrified that I would never be able to go back to being the happy, comparatively normal child that I had once been, and feared that I was going to stay trapped in an internal volcanic explosion until I died.In another unbelievable scene, the family is having a serious conversation around the dinner table, and Tally interrupts to ask for a drink of juice. Tally clearly explains to the reader the state that she gets in, showing that she is not acting out for selfish reasons, but is suffering tremendously and cannot contain herself.

Still, despite its stylistic flaws, this book has an encouraging message and provides what appears to be an extremely realistic representation of autism, even though I cannot speak from personal knowledge of it. At school, however, she repeatedly comments that she feels like having a melt-down, but she just can't, because she doesn't want her friends to see. The reader is supposed to believe that the main character, Tally, is a mainstreamed student at a public middle school, but the way her behavior is portrayed, there is no way she would be mainstreamed, and particularly without an IEP and all her teachers knowing what her needs were, which is not the case in this story. I am not autistic, and I had the very great blessing of being homeschooled, which I appreciated even more after reading this book.

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I have had this book sitting on a shelf for ages and I have decided to read it all and for anyone with autism it will make you more confident and people without it, it will make you more kind towards people with autism. She was trying so hard to explain her thoughts and her behaviors and the way that her autism affected her, and yet I continued to have thoughts of "oh my word, I don't know what I would do if I was the parent in this situation. It was so accurate, and even though Tally's triggers were different than mine, I cannot even imagine what an overwhelming comfort it would have been if I could have read something like this when I was twelve. I experience a lot of what you do which is great as then all autistic peaople have each other to team up with to be able to stick together, whatever Autism throws our way.And yes, the book does tell you what it's like for Tally to live with autism but it didn't persuade me that she is any more important than anyone else because of it. However, the book as a whole wasn't the most engaging--the plot is rather slow for much of it, and the Tally's Autism Facts sections, while informative, are also a bit info-dump-y, and I wasn't ever sure if the story was supposed to take place in the US or UK.