Eighteen | Book Review

There is nothing wrong with saying "Down syndrome," "disability," "difference." Naming things as they are lets us look at them without flinching—and lets us face life head-on. It lets you do that too, Emma. I feel I respect you more this way, and I give you the chance to define who you are over time as you reckon with disability." But reckoning with disability is not just Emma's work, or her family's: we all carry the looks and gestures that can change the life of anyone we meet. In Salani's book we meet the author and her daughter through eighteen snapshots—one for each year of Emma's life—a young woman who is "likeable, funny, very determined but not special." An invitation to know her, so we might shed our prejudices, our conformism, and our indifference. The hope is that only the birthday in the title, and the gift that comes with it, stay truly special.