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Strong Female Character

Fern Brady

IN BRIEF

An award-winning memoir by Scottish comedian Fern Brady exploring autistic lived experience, later diagnosis, masking, gendered stereotypes, mental health, class and the impact of being misunderstood.

FROM THE MEMBER

A memoir about being autistic and not being recognised as autistic, by someone whose experiences were read as almost everything else first.
It’s a hard read in places and I’d want people to know that before they start. What it does well is show how much of a life can be misread when the framework is wrong, and how differently the same events land once it isn’t. For anyone working with women and girls identified late, it’s an education in what gets missed.
Recommended by Helen

OUR REVIEW

Strong Female Character is a candid memoir that challenges narrow ideas about what autism is supposed to look like. Fern Brady revisits experiences once interpreted as behavioural, psychiatric or personal problems through the perspective of later diagnosis. The book won the 2023 Nero Book Award for Non-Fiction and the Books Are My Bag Non-Fiction Award; its audiobook also won a 2024 British Book Award. The Salvesen Mindroom Research Centre positively reviewed its value in challenging stereotypes around autistic girls and women. It is one person’s account rather than a guide to autism.

 

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Why this may be of benefit

 

For practitioners, neurodivergent people and others supporting neurodivergent people, Brady’s memoir may prompt reflection on masking, gendered assumptions and the impact of being misunderstood, and offer recognition to readers revisiting their own past.

 

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Anything worth knowing before someone reads or listens

 

Includes potentially distressing themes: abuse, self-harm, homelessness, psychiatric crisis and sex work.

ISBN (if relevant)

9781914240478

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