"In A Different Key - The Story of Autism" by John Donvan & Caren Zucker is not just about the current knowledge of Autism but it takes us back all the way to the early 1900's. I picked up this book as my family does have children and adults that are on the spectrum of Autism most are considered high functioning so this book really intrigued me. However I was a little nervous that it would read like a textbook but it did not. This book is so well written on the history of Autism and does not leave out parts of history even the ugly parts. What do I mean the ugly parts I mean the years where we blamed the mothers for it, the institutionalized portion, and many other sad ugly things done to people with autism. A lot of people forget that Autism is not a newer disease it has been around a long time and we really don't know how long. This book does bring up that people that were categorized as "idiots" in the 1840's would have likely be diagnosed with Autism today which is something a lot of people don't realize. I also really enjoyed that when the authors brought up a young man with Autism who was put in a State hospital for the insane at the age of 5 in 1919 they did not just leave his story there. As time progressed in Autism history they did tell us what happened that man. We read about the desperate measures parents took whether they were good or bad to do what they thought was best for their children. I also really enjoyed learning the history on some of big names in science and psychiatry that helped us learn more about Autism. I learned so much from this book that I just cannot type it all down without all the details they give. If you have any interest in learning about Autism this book is a wonderful read even with it long length, its a must read in my opinion. I highly recommend it and I will be keeping this one in my library to reference when I need to.
I was given this book from Blogging for Books for my honest review and was not required to give a positive review.
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