#WeNeedDiverseBooks and YA Migraine Reads! #MHAM
We Need Diverse Books is a wonderful campaign trying to bring awareness to the underrepresented in our literature. They promote everyone you can think of from people with disabilities, LGBT communities, or even ethnic minorities and more. We are finally started to include those on the fringe in conversations.
We Need Diverse Books classifies disabilities as:
We subscribe to a broad definition of disability, which includes but is not limited to physical, sensory, cognitive, intellectual, or developmental disabilities, chronic conditions, and mental illnesses (this may also include addiction). Furthermore, we subscribe to a social model of disability, which presents disability as created by barriers in the social environment, due to lack of equal access, stereotyping, and other forms of marginalization.
Since June is National Migraine Awareness Month, and migraines definetly fit into the chronic condition category (especially, chronic migraine), I thought I’d list a couple YA books that have migraines in them! (Unfortunately, I haven’t come across a lot. If you know of more, let me know–I love reading about characters with migraines.)
- Vision by Lisa Amowitz. The main characters gets migraines though they aren’t necessarily neuro/bio related—but hey, pain is pain in my book. You can read an excerpt here.
- The Angel Experiment (Maximum Ride) by James Patterson. Near the end of the book, Max starts to get sudden, severe headaches. They sound severe enough to be migraines though they do not have any other normal symptoms. I haven’t read the rest of the series to know where the story line goes with this.
- Legend trilogy by Marie Lu. Day doesn’t get migraines right away in the series, but they’re biologically related. Don’t want to say anything more 🙂
- The Bone Season by Samantha Shannon. Not only does Shannon suffer from migraines, but they inspired her novel. You can read all about her type of migraine, how she copes, and how it inspired the novel here.
- The Migraine Mafia by Maia Sepp. This isn’t a YA novel, but it’s on my to-read list. It’s about the reality of migraine, working, and a woman’s quirky support group.
Most YA books that feature migraines with a supernatural or paranormal element—something that makes the migraine special, to make the pain have a higher purpose. While I enjoy reading books like that (I mean, I would love to find out my migraines were actually a result of a hidden talent!!), I’d also love to see more YA books with characters who deal with real migraines, especially if they’re saving the world while trying to manage episodic or chronic migraine.
So lets find some more diverse migraine books!