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Who Wants Normal?

Who Wants Normal?

The Disabled Girls’ Guide to Life

Summary

Brought to you by Penguin.

A groundbreaking, essential and electrifying blend of memoir, handbook, celebration and call to action, from the acclaimed journalist and campaigner.


'No one really talks about it. No one really talks about what it is to be a disabled woman, especially a young one. To go a bit mad. To experience pain or exhaustion or feel 92. To navigate all the standard parts of life - exams, careers, dating - but with a body that is different than everyone else’s.'

Exploring six facets of life: education, careers, health, body image, relationships and representation, as well as how to survive life's bumps in the road, Who Wants Normal? is a game-changing take on disability and feminism.

Part memoir, part manifesto, and full of Frances Ryan's trademark warmth, humour and honesty (as well as hard-hitting statistics), it draws on her own experience as well as from interviews with over 40 of the world's leading women and non-binary people with mental and physical health conditions, including Selma Blair, Jillian Mercado, Sophie Morgan, Ruth Madeley, Sinead Burke, Rosie Jones, Fearne Cotton, Jack Monroe, Emma Barnett, Imani Barbarin and Jameela Jamil.

Who Wants Normal? lifts the lid off a subject that is too often shrouded in awkwardness and silence. It offers support, inspiration and a sense of solidarity to the many, many women with disabilities and long-term health issues – as well as opening the eyes of anyone wanting to better understand the many facets of living with a disability.

© Frances Ryan 2025 (P) Penguin Audio 2025

Reviews

  • A razor sharp, super-smart manifesto by one of the most vital voices in British journalism today. This guide is a crucial call to action not just for disabled women, but for everyone who wants to have a better understanding of what it means to live with a disability
    Yomi Adegoke

About the author

Frances Ryan

Frances Ryan is an award-winning journalist and author. For the last decade, she has been a columnist and reporter at the Guardian. Named Commentator of the Year 2024 by the Society of Editors, Ryan’s work has made the front pages of the New York Times, the Guardian and British Vogue. It has helped change government policy, been discussed in the House of Commons, and featured anywhere from Channel 4 News, to BBC Radio 4's Woman's Hour to The World Tonight.

Her debut book, Crippled, (2019, Verso), was shortlisted for the Bread and Roses Award 2020, and made into the short drama Hen Night for the BBC in 2021. Twice highly commended at the National Press Awards, Ryan was named as one of Britain’s ‘30 exceptional women journalists’ by Women In Journalism in 2022. The same year, she became a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature. Ryan lives in Nottingham and has a PhD in politics from the University of Nottingham.
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