Editors Kyra Anderson and Vicki Forman, both parents and writers, have crafted an anthology to encourage a sense of connection among parents and transcend divisive autism politics. Readers of their book are invited into the contributors’ lives where they’re sure to find an attitude, a circumstance, an epiphany they can relate to. Within these accounts of fierce love and keen regard for their unique children, lie moments of exceptional clarity and transformation. These pieces are sure to resonate with parents, caregivers, and anyone who’s interested in the world of autism. The name of the book is “GRAVITY PULLS YOU IN: PERSPECTIVES ON PARENTING CHILDREN ON THE AUTISM SPECTRUM.”

The Editors

Kyra Anderson chronicles life as a homeschooling mom and writer on her blog, thismom.com. Her work has appeared in several small presses. Her memoir, How My Son’s Asperger’s Saved My Ass, is in progress.  She lives in New England with her son and children’s book writer/illustrator husband, David Milgrim.

Vicki Forman is the author of This Lovely Life: A Memoir of Premature Motherhood (Houghton Mifflin/Mariner, 2009), winner of the Bread Loaf Writers Conference Bakeless Prize. Her work has appeared in the Seneca Review, the Santa Monica Review, and the anthologies Love You to Pieces: Creative Writers on Raising a Child with Special Needs and Literary Mama: Reading for the Maternally Inclined. She lives outside of Los Angeles with her husband and daughter. 

Approximately 1 in 100 children have autism.

By now, most of us are acquainted with autism in some way.  But all too often, people with autism are  portrayed as either astounding savants or noncommunicative, isolated beings, and their loved ones as either relentlessly pursuing a cure or overwhelmed and grief-stricken.

Isn’t it more likely that the community of autism lies somewhere in the middle of these extremes?

Kyra Anderson and Vicki Forman, editors of the new autism anthology, Gravity Pulls You In, can share with your audience their personal experiences and perspectives, and in doing so, help to dispel autism myths, forge a deeper connection among parents, and dismantle some of the fear surrounding autism. In addition, they can talk about what they’ve learned from editing their book’s contributors–mothers and fathers raising children on the autism spectrum–their hopes for children with autism, and what they want the wider world to know about their lives.

As the editors and contributors convey, it is through one conversation at a time, one essay at a time, one poem at a time, that we as a community and society can truly see and then embrace the diversity that exists within a population of kids that may seem “other” and through that, unite ALL of us.