Neurotribes

There's a lot to explore in the field of autism, and Silberman did a yeoman's effort for a complete layperson. There are so many misconceptions – such as the idea that “autism” is a single diagnostic entity, or that there is some explosion in people with autism, or that vaccines (or GMOs or gluten or the pseudoscience du jour) causes autism. So the idea that there could be a book to systematically explore autism and related topics was deeply appealing. However, this is not that book. Silberman's work is so uneven that it's hard to even analyze as a single volume. There are very intently focused parts (mostly, the history of Asperger, and the way in which he isn't a Nazi) and very shallowly explored parts. The use of illustrative individual case histories is helpful, but with such a shallow lens, people blend together.

Some key topics that Silberman touches on will be very interesting to people who have not been previously exposed to the issues: the fact that the autism spectrum is and has always been a spectrum; the intrinsic nature of autism to the personality of autists and the embracing of autism by many adult autists; the idea that “autism” is not necessarily a disorder, but that in many cases is a personality style that could be embraced and that the increased incidence of autism is almost completely accounted for by changing diagnostic criteria. Most of these topics have been widely explored elsewhere, and perhaps the most interesting: neurodiversity, is giving only glancing treatment by Silberman. Overall, the history portions were interesting and well done, and the rest would have benefited from more exposure to the topic.