Finding a Different Kind of Normal

Jeanette Purkis has been to some extraordinary places, experiencing harsh situations that most of us are lucky enough to be sheltered from. In this autobiography she relates the path that took her there.

The early chapters deal with Jeanette's early life in England, growing up in the highly structured environment of the Christadelphians. It's a stable upbringing, but even at this stage she has problems with socialising and learning that will be familiar to anyone who knows about Asperger Syndrome. The style is direct, but the author tends to report everything indiscriminately, from unusual anecdotes to complete trivia. The book could do with better editing, because at the beginning it's quite hard to get into. Fortunately this problem doesn't affect later chapters.

The author then relates how she became interested in socialism after moving to Australia, throwing off one set of rules in order to embrace another. She documents how this led her into a downward spiral of prison, drug addiction and other bad experiences. Reading this account, written with the benefit of hindsight, it's easy to see how each step would lead inevitably to the next. It serves as a cautionary tale to anyone with a diagnosis of Asperger Syndrome, or anyone who cares for someone with this condition, of how things can go badly wrong. A combination of character traits related to Asperger Syndrome made her particularly vulnerable to exploitation, and to getting into a downward spiral of destructive behaviours.

Finding a Different Kind of Normal is made more useful for its honesty, always a good feature in an autobiography. Jeanette Purkis doesn't hold back on the details, and the result is an eye-opening account that contains a lot of valuable lessons for other people.