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A brutally honest report on growing up autistic and female in the central belt of Scotland.
It's a difficult book to write about, as there are ways our lives overlap which is what drew me to it, but the divergences and the extent of the trauma she seems to have suffered make any personal comparison irrelevant. The reading experience was a familiar background and setting, into which jarring and bizarre events are inserted, and occasional info dumps about aspects of autism that are used to cap off some chapters.
Her humor cuts through to counterpoint the horror, but the bitter, acerbic assessment of many of the people she's met often leaves a sour taste.
I wonder what this book might have been like with a little more time to reflect and refine, but it's probably better that we have it now to lift a mirror to the ongoing crisis autistic women are suffering through.

Initially I wasn't sure what i was getting myself into. The art style lies somewhere between the goth, manga and furry sections of deviant art, and it opens with a slave auction and quickly moves onto an extremely violent jail break. But along the way a deep and complex world is built up and i found myself getting drawn into the many mysteries surrounding the protagonist.

In a way it's reminiscent of many other epics, Naruto and Harry Potter in particular, but the predominately female cast, ornate decoration and grand spectral vistas set it apart. The stark brutality that the protagonist suffers through reminds me of The Fifth Season and The Parable of the Sower as well. Against my expectations, I'm looking forward to the next books and finding out more about this world.

Also, cats. Lots of cats.

Merged review:

Initially I wasn't sure what i was getting myself into. The art style lies somewhere between the goth, manga and furry sections of deviant art, and it opens with a slave auction and quickly moves onto an extremely violent jail break. But along the way a deep and complex world is built up and i found myself getting drawn into the many mysteries surrounding the protagonist.

In a way it's reminiscent of many other epics, Naruto and Harry Potter in particular, but the predominately female cast, ornate decoration and grand spectral vistas set it apart. The stark brutality that the protagonist suffers through reminds me of The Fifth Season and The Parable of the Sower as well. Against my expectations, I'm looking forward to the next books and finding out more about this world.

Also, cats. Lots of cats.

I can see why this book is unfavourably compared to some of the other early cosmere books, but that has more to do with how brilliant they are than anything else. By itself, this is an excellent fantasy novel with an interesting structure and lots to say about the intersection of faith, religion, politics and power.
It is a little frustrating just how few of the larger mysteries of this setting are resolved by the end, and there is some plotting that I'd expect Sanderson to handle with more subtlety these days. While there are plenty of women with potentially interesting characters, all are outshone by the female protagonist in a way that didn't quite seem to occur for the men, which is reminiscent of Vin in The Final Empire but he seems to have improved with age in this regard. There's also a lack of class perspective, and given that the mechanism of Elantris allows for anyone to be promoted into a position of interest, this feels like a missed opportunity.
However, it's still a good story, told well, with plenty of action and intrigue and a mostly sufferable romance to boot.

Come for the guide to debate, stay for the name dropping anecdotes.
While I innately enjoy a good faith argument, the artificial nature of formal debates which devolve into petty point scoring to appeal to an audiences worst tendencies means I tend to avoid them where possible. However, there are many situations in life where you find yourself needing to plead your case, and Mehdi's pedigree piqued my interest.
The heart of this book is a guide to preparing for, structuring and presenting an argument. A lot of his advice is familiar, but having it presented together, coherently is useful as you can see how various strategies work together to produce a strong result. It is liberally peppered with anecdotes from his own career ( and more Churchill than you would expect or frankly desire ) which add plenty of flavour, and the audiobook includes recordings of many of the examples which is great.
One thing that did occur to me is that much of his advice boils down to appearing as normal and relatable as possible, which is good advice in this context but perhaps goes a long way to explaining why some people find it difficult to argue their case as they have much more to overcome to achieve that goal.
A solid and entertaining guide for anyone who finds themselves having to persuade people on a regular basis, useful for beginners and the experienced alike.

A book that is best when it's doing what is supposed to be, and worst when it's trying to do something else. It's pitched as a guide to autistic masking and a way to review your own making habits, and when it's on task it is insightful and helpful, though it leans heavily on collective anecdote rather than the small but existing body of research on this area. Dr Price isn't that sort of doctor though, they are a social psychologist and far more interested in railing against systemic social issues which pads this book out to the modern expected length for non fiction self help books.
Most of his positions are plausible and passionately argued, and if you're looking for a neurodiversity acceptance manifesto you've found it, but at times it feels like this was written for the approval of an extremely online clique more than the wider neurodiverse community at large. The result is a book that is a bit of a slog to get through with most of its hidden gems buried towards the end, that is going to seem extremely dated in a few short years.
Worth a read/listen if you are curious about the latest social thinking about autism and related conditions, but this wasn't the science backed breakdown and review of how masking develops or functions I was hoping for.