In addition to writing Disability Visibility, you are the founder of the Disability Visibility Project. What prompted you to start the online community, and how can young readers interact with it to find community of their own?

I originally started the Disability Visibility Project (DVP) in 2014 as an oral history campaign encouraging disabled people across the country to record their stories in the lead-up to the twenty-fifth anniversary of the Americans with Disabilities Act in 2015. I was tired of not seeing disability history taught in school, with the exception of the same small handful of famous disabled people like Helen Keller and FDR. The DVP grew quickly into an online community with a podcast, guest essays, and more. There’s a lot of content people can find on my website or by following me on Instagram and Twitter. The DVP is my attempt to create work by us and for us.

What advice do you have for young people looking to write or start their own entrepreneurial projects?

Knowing what’s out there is a start, and seeing other projects that are good examples of what to do and what not to do is helpful, too. Before you launch a name or hashtag, check if it’s already in use by others. If you’re working on a project, figure out how much time you have, what budget you’ll need, how you can make it sustainable, and what will set you apart. Are you filling a need? Will this give you joy? Is it a good use of your time? If you are interested in writing, start with what you care about. Journal writing can help you develop your voice and a place for your thoughts. It’s private so you don’t have to edit; you can just write without any rules. I also try to learn from my past work and try to challenge myself. I’m still figuring stuff out and cringe at some of my essays from a few years ago. So maybe that’s a sign of growth?

Can you talk about the process of selecting essays to be included in Disability Visibility? How did you find authors of the essays, and how did you decide what to keep in the young adult adaptation?

I bookmark a lot of great articles, essays, and websites for my own use. When I wrote the book proposal for the adult version of Disability Visibility, I had a spreadsheet of over fifty essays I wanted to include. During the manuscript phase, my editor, Catherine Tung, and I narrowed it down to thirty-seven because each was singular and covered an issue or perspective that is important to me. I knew most of the authors already from social media or as acquaintances and friends. It helped that I spent many years developing these relationships so people knew and trusted me. Beverly Horowitz and Rebecca Gudelis of Delacorte Press reached out to me and suggested the seventeen pieces that are in the young reader version because of length and content.

Are there any stories of disability you feel are yet to be told and would have liked to include?

There are always a ton more stories to be told! Universes upon universes! I want to hear from young disabled people, disabled artists, activists, and people from all walks of life. I want to see more work by disabled queer people, disabled gender-nonconforming people, and Black, Brown, and Indigenous disabled people. Publishing has barely scratched the surface when it comes to the richness and diversity of disabled lives.

As you were editing the essays, what were some things that really struck you?

It is a great responsibility to be an editor, and my role was to give the authors another perspective, to ask questions, and to make suggestions. I took a lot of care with their words. The contributions excited me because they were all very different, yet all were personal, political, and powerful. I appreciated the contributors’ participation in this anthology and the efforts they made in the editing process, which can be time-consuming and difficult. (I say this as a writer who understands the pain.) There wouldn’t be an anthology without them. I continue to love the essay form, since the contributors were able to express themselves clearly and concisely. Longform works seem more daunting to me!

Can you share some memories you have of being in school?

I am “an old,” as the kids say. I attended grade school in Indianapolis in the 1980s and loved reading, writing, social studies, art, and going to the library. One of my favorite places was the Nora Branch of the Indianapolis Public Library, where I attended summer reading programs. Good times. Later, I became a volunteer and got to listen to kids talk about books at the Carmel Public Library in Carmel, Indiana, when I was in high school. By the way, support your local library and volunteer or donate if you can!

Do you have hopes for how this book will be received and used in schools and libraries now?

With any anthology, I hope there is something for everyone, and the length of the essays make them ideal for short assignments and readings. It would be awesome if teachers used this in English, cultural studies, or history classes. I’d love to see libraries or student groups form book clubs or use it as a springboard to encourage students, especially disabled students, to tell their stories. There’s also a free plain-language summary and discussion guide, both by disabled writers, available as resources for teachers, students, and librarians.

Time for a fun rapid-fire round!

Name a book or books you won’t ever part with.

Let Papa Sleep by Crosby Bonsall

What’s your favorite food or snack?

Coffee and pie (or cookies, or doughnuts)

Who is a person/group doing amazing work that you admire?

I think Sandy Ho, the founder and co-organizer of the Disability & Intersectionality Summit, is pretty awesome! Full disclosure: I am on their steering committee.

Name something that brings you joy.

Group texts with friends, fancy snacks, and Netflix

What’s next for you after finishing Disability Visibility?

Thank you for asking! I am about to turn in the manuscript for my memoir, Year of the Tiger, which will be published by Vintage Books in 2022. I have a few other fun projects lined up next year, and if I’m really organized, I’ll start outlining a proposal for another anthology I want to edit.

When I was in high school, I ate all my lunches in the library. Most of my friends weren’t on the same lunch schedule as I was, plus my creative writing independent study was the period right after lunch, so it kind of made sense—I could go in early, eat there, and read. Then, when the bell rang, I’d be ideally situated to start working on my book. I got to know the librarians, a couple named Mr. and Mrs. Larson, pretty well during that time; they’d frequently bring in secret doughnuts that were only meant to be shared with those of us who basically lived in the library, who came to school early so we could browse the stacks, who checked out so many books every week that the Larsons had to raise the weekly limit just for us.

I was also struggling with depression.

And maybe that had more to do with my library lunches than I could admit.

Felicity, the main character in A Lesson in Vengeance, also struggles with depression. I can see reflections of my younger self in her: the way she self-isolates, how she constructs these narratives for her own life, ones she thinks are maybe more palatable than the truth. She, like myself, loses herself in literature, in other worlds that aren’t her own, where she doesn’t have to exist in the space of her own body and life.

Sometimes I wonder how much of that the Larsons recognized in me. I missed several weeks of school at various points when I was hospitalized for suicide attempts. I wonder if they knew why I was gone. Either way, they were a touchstone for me throughout high school. By the end, I had started calling them my parents, because in a lot of ways it felt like they were—always ready with good advice or a warm embrace or even just a fresh Krispy Kreme.

They’re the kind of people I think Felicity needed, too. Maybe if she’d had her own Larsons, she would have known on some level that people existed—particularly adults—who were there for her, who cared enough to still be there when she rose out of the mire of another episode.

When I graduated high school, though, I had to finally bring back all the library books I’d been sneaking out of the media center for the past four years. (Even the Larsons’ inflated check-out limit was not enough for me.) I left them in several huge black trash bags just inside and crept off, humiliated. I didn’t leave a note. I figured they had no way of knowing it was me; those books could have been left there by anyone. But then the phone rang a week later and my mother—my biological mother, not my library mother—picked up. It was Mrs. Larson.

She wanted to thank me for returning all those books.

Meet Savanna Ganucheau! Savanna is the artist behind the new graphic novel adaptation of Jennifer L. Holm’s Newbery Honor–winning Turtle in Paradise.

Savanna got her start in comics by self-publishing and selling her work in small comic book shops around New Orleans. Savanna’s artwork has appeared in notable publications, including Jem and the Holograms, Adventure Time, and Lumberjanes. Her first graphic novel, Bloom, is published by First Second. Here, Savanna shares her process for bringing Turtle in Paradise to life.

GANUCHEAU: I did a lot of research, but Jenni was also able to help me a lot. She had done tons of research for the novel, and I was able to take advantage of that. I had a great time researching clothing. I stayed away from catalogs of the time and focused more on photos from the 1930s of children in rural areas.

GANUCHEAU: Definitely the docks. Boats were another thing that was particularly challenging for me. The sponging boats used in 1930s Key West were rarely photographed, so it was difficult for me to find a comprehensive reference that wasn’t a vague side view. And in the 1940s, Key West saw a huge boom in the shrimping industry, which took over most of the sponging industry, so I couldn’t even use photos taken at a later time. Basically, if I saw shrimping boats in a picture, I knew it was from the 1940s and didn’t use it.

GANUCHEAU: Showing our past through images and stories (real or fictional) is a wonderful opportunity for people to relate to historical events in a very human way. I think people have trouble being invested in certain eras of time. Showing the day-to-day life and interactions between characters can help people feel involved in that history and be willing to learn more about it.

GANUCHEAU: We talked about a lot of options when it came to differentiating the flashbacks from the present. In addition to changing up the panel borders, I told Lark I wanted to evoke a sepia-tone feel, and we agreed that we wanted it to feel more creative. Lark did amazing work making the colors memorable. I think what she did with the pink color hold on the balloons is unique and makes the flashback pages stand out.

GANUCHEAU: Pressure from myself, for sure. Haha. I absolutely wanted it to be accurate. I’m a huge fan of historical fiction, and while there are a few anachronisms in the book (clothing, mostly), I tried to make it as accurate as I could. The docks were particularly hard because they simply do not exist in the same capacity as they did in the 1930s. And there’s really only a small trace of their layout in the documents I found. (I found some Sanborn Maps that gave me a vague idea.) For this scene, I used a lot of souvenir cards from the 1930s to get a sense of how the turtle kraals looked. In fact, panel one is heavily inspired by one of those cards.