One of the difficulties with the portrayal of autistic individuals in media is they can often be portrayed as savant. In this blog, I’m going to break down what that means and how we can portray autistic individuals with a bit more care in our stories. What Does “Savant” mean? If I said, Raymond inContinueContinue reading “How To Tackle The Autistic Savant Stereotype”
Category Archives: Writing Autistic Characters
How Understanding Autism Can Deepen Character Development
Autism and deeper character development may not sound like they work together. In this blog, I’m going to break down how you can use the understanding of autism to deepen your understanding of your own characters. 1. Special Interests We’ve all seen those representations of autism where the individual has a special interest in aContinueContinue reading “How Understanding Autism Can Deepen Character Development”
How To Interpret Love From An Autistic Person
Autistic individuals express love through five unique languages: Infodumping shares their world with caring facts; Parallel Play offers companionship without social pressure; Support Swapping helps manage tasks and reduces shame; Deep Pressure provides calming weight in overwhelming moments; and Targeted Gifting shows thoughtfulness through gifts that resonate personally.
How To Give Sensory Comfort To Each Sense
The blog discusses strategies for autistic individuals to provide comfort to their senses, covering touch, smell, sight, taste, and hearing. It emphasizes personal preferences, suggesting self-care items like soft fabrics, mild scents, dim lighting, safe food options, and tools to manage noise. Overall, it highlights the importance of self-awareness and comfort.
How To Navigate Christmas As An Autistic Person
Christmas can be a very overwhelming time for autistic people. This blog shares tips around gifts, routine, safe spaces, food and clothes decisions so everyone can enjoy the day.
How Special Interests Deepen Your Character Development
Special interests, often misunderstood, can significantly enhance character development in writing. They help create multidimensional personalities, facilitate unique communication methods, and promote learning and bonding among characters. By incorporating various interests, writers can convey deeper narratives and foster connections that enrich storylines, moving beyond superficial portrayals of characters.
How To Avoid Writing Diverse Stories We’re Bored of Reading
Having a diverse idea can be a great thing, but the downside comes if we’re trying to write something that involves a particular community we may not be fully familiar with, ie autism or LGBTQ+. I’ll highlight what we’re bored of reading to truly have a fresh take on those characters. 1. Limit Writing ComingContinueContinue reading “How To Avoid Writing Diverse Stories We’re Bored of Reading”
How To Write Diverse Autistic Characters
As April is Autism Acceptance Month, I’m going to continue the theme with this week’s blog by delving into how to write diverse autistic characters. 1. Gender In creating any character, we think about what serves the story best. Sadly, what often happens when autistic characters are created is they come from stereotypes society picturesContinueContinue reading “How To Write Diverse Autistic Characters”
What Is A Sensitivity Reader?
If I asked you what a Sensitivity Reader is, would you know? I’m also fairly certain that there are quite a few people who would think I’m here to berate people writing autistic characters, telling them off for their work, nitpicking and whinging “you can’t do that!”. Well, you’re wrong. What Are We? Whether youContinueContinue reading “What Is A Sensitivity Reader?”
5 Things To Remember When Writing Autistic Characters
Writing autistic characters can be quite difficult and daunting. We are so varied from one another that if you’re not autistic it can be SO easy to fall into the trap of stereotypical, one dimensional characters. This set of 5 things is a little guidance of things to think about when creating autistic characters. 1.ContinueContinue reading “5 Things To Remember When Writing Autistic Characters”