Donna Williams was a child with more labels than a jam-jar: deaf, wild
disturbed, stupid insane... She lived within herself, her own world her
foreground, ours a background she only visited. Isolated from her self
and from the outside world, Donna was, in her words, a Nobody Nowhere.
She swung violently between these two worlds, battling to join our world
and, simultaneously, to keep it out. Abandoned from all connection to
the self within her, she lived as a ghost with a body, a patchwork of
the images which bombarded her. Intact but detached from the seemingly
incomprehensible world around her, she lived in what she called 'a world
under glass`.
After twenty-five years of being misunderstood, and unable to understand
herself, Donna stumbled upon the word 'autism': a label, but one which
held up a mirror and made sense of her life and struggles, and gave her
a chance to finally forgive both herself and those around her.
Nobody Nowhere is disturbing, eloquent and ticklishly funny: it is an
account of the soul of someone who lived the word 'autism' and survived
in an unsympathetic environment despite intense inner chaos and
incomprehension. It describes how, against the odds, Donna came to live
independently, achieve a place at university, and write this remarkable
autobiography. It is now an international bestseller, sold in over 14
languages throughout the world. This is a book that will stay with you
as one of the most exceptional works you will ever read.
