Defiant (Shaping Clay)

Clay Dillon is neuroqueer, and he needs to make peace with it. After thirty years, he finally knows the truth: that he is and always has been autistic, and that most of his problems getting along came from a lack of awareness of himself a lack that came not from being autistic, but from having no knowledge of the gap between what he knew of his own needs and what others expected them to be. This is changing, though, and the change brings a freedom that is at once great and terrible. It grants him answers, but it also alters his ways of perceiving himself. Feelings that were dismissed at puberty are rushing to the forefront of his perceptions, and Clay is beginning to question what his desires are, and even who he is, as his world shifts around him. Clay's move from compliance to defiance, from heteronormative and allistic performance to honesty and inner strength, is narrated in clear, stunning, and revelatory language. - N.I. Nicholson, author of Novena (remixed) and Editor-in-Chief of Barking Sycamores Michael deftly navigates Clay's exploration of the shifting boundaries of disclosure and his struggles to balance his personal and professional lives, bringing both insight and unflinching honesty to the narrative. - Cynthia Kim, author of I Think I Might Be Autistic and Nerdy, Shy, and Socially Inappopriate For many of us a late-in-life autism diagnosis asks as many questions as it answers. Defiant takes a bare bones approach in speaking to readers from that very angle. - S.R. Salas, author of Black and White: A Colorful Look at Life on the Autism Spectrum