Love, Hope and Autism

Love, Hope and Autism is a slim volume which introduces autism, written by a parent for parents. As well as a brief guide to some of the characteristics of autism, this book recounts the experiences involved in having an autistic child from a parent's perspective.

If you buy this book at the recommended price of £9.99, it works out at nearly 10 pence per page - hardly cheap. What you get is fairly basic in terms of information. There are plenty of pointers to further sources, but that is not why I would buy a book. The true value of this is in the reassurance of reading about the experiences of parents whose lives may be strikingly similar to your own.

Joanna Edgar describes the gradual discovery that her second son, Peter, is autistic. She takes the reader over her initial nagging doubts, through to his definite diagnosis and on to early education. Her reactions to these events are fairly typical of many parents whose children are on the autistic spectrum: initial disbelief, gradual acceptance, and disappointment at the lack of help from professionals.

The author also includes letters from other parents, recounting their anecdotes and observations. Whilst the stories are largely well-written and enlightening, it's the sort of thing you could find on forums, Usenet groups or at your local support group.

Peter was helped in his speech using a little-known therapy known as the A Z Method. It would be nice to have read a lot more about this, since the author sings its praises. Unfortunately she skims over it briefly. The method involves using video to teach language, but if you want to learn much more than that then there is only an address at the end of the book for you to write to.

Edgar introduces some of the more common methods of teaching autistics, although in an entirely uncritical way. She gives the reader an indication of which methods are available and roughly what they involve, but that is all.

The chapter on statementing is worthwhile if you are new to the process. It gives an example of what one parent wrote on their form. Whilst you can't use this as a template, all children being very different, it is a good indication of the amount of detail that you should go into on that document.

Love, Hope and Autism is written with the newbie in mind. If you want to read something that outlines the basics in an easily digestible manner, this is it. It's not too mushy and sentimental, but it does focus on people rather than statistics. However it is a disappointingly short book, which makes it poor value if you purchase it. Considering that the information within isn't especially privileged, it's probably not a worthwhile buy for those who already have more than a cursory knowledge of autism.