Unstoppable: Women With Disabilities

by Helen Wolfe, Karen Patkau (Illustrator)

Overview

Around the world, people living with disabilities face barriers in the built environment, in employment and education, and in social attitudes and policies that can make it hard to live a full and satisfying life.

The ten women we meet in this book face physical and mental health challenges, some from birth and some who became disabled later in life. But they all share the determination to make the world a better place, not just for themselves but for those who will come after them. Their fields are as diverse as elite sport, neurosurgery, architecture, and environmental activism, and while some have devoted themselves to disability policy, others prefer to lead by example. In either case they have proved themselves to be unstoppable.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781772602098
Publisher:	Second Story Press
Publication date:	09/21/2021
Pages:	24
Product dimensions:	8.50(w) x 11.00(h) x 0.25(d)
Age Range:	9 - 12 Years

About the Author

Helen Wolfe’s forty-year career has spanned across education, publishing, and social work. She has written over thirty teachers’ guides for books as well as for a documentary about blind adults. Helen also has a lifelong physical disability, which requires her to use crutches, a wheelchair, and a scooter. In writing Unstoppable, Helen has instilled her empathy, life experiences, and insights about being a person with a disability. She lives in Toronto.

Karen Patkau graduated from the University of Manitoba with a Bachelor of Fine Arts Honours degree, and became interested in visual storytelling while studying for her Master of Visual Arts degree at the University of Alberta. She has been writing and illustrating for many years. Her work appears in children’s picture books, educational publications, posters, advertisements, magazines, package designs, greeting cards and art exhibitions. Karen has a life-long disability and walks with a prosthetic leg. Karen lives in Toronto.

Editorial Reviews

"These brief biographies, insightfully presented by an author with a physical disability herself, may motivate readers to do further research on these inspiring women."

Booklist

"Unstoppable: Women with Disabilities is an inspirational showcase of female role models, highly recommended for both school and public library children's collections."

MBR: Children's Bookwatch

01/01/2022

Gr 4–7—Wolfe, who has a physical disability herself, highlights the lives of 10 women with disabilities. They are a refreshingly diverse bunch; Wolfe has carefully selected women who have a range of disabilities, are employed in a variety of careers, and hail from all around the globe. Included, for example, is Greta Thunberg, a young Swedish climate change activist with autism. Haben Girma, an American whose parents emigrated from Eritrea, is blind and Deaf and in her work as a lawyer advocates for the rights of people with disabilities. Zhang Haidi is Chinese and lost the use of her legs as a child; she will be the head organizer of the Chinese Paralympians in 2022. A spread is devoted to each woman. The left side has a large colorful illustrated image of the subject, while the right side contains a page of text with biographical information that includes the subject's disability and recounts their significant accomplishments. Entries include a direct quote that encapsulates some of the principles guiding the work of the individual. VERDICT This collection of biographies is a great window into the lives of 10 contemporary and accomplished women with disabilities. Recommended for middle school readers.—Ragan O'Malley

School Library Journal

2021-07-14
Wolfe, herself physically disabled, introduces 10 contemporary women with disabilities.

As a teacher, writer, and social worker, the author “hardly saw any people like [her]” in her 40-year career: “Imagine how great it would have been to learn about other women with disabilities!” she exclaims. Her conversational profiles of disabled women from various countries and cultures turn her wish into reality. Most subjects’ disabilities are physical, ranging from spina bifida to limb difference; their careers include advocacy, law, and entertainment. Swedish climate activist Greta Thunberg is autistic. Yetnebersh Nigussie, who is blind, co-founded the Ethiopian Center for Disability and Development, which promotes accessibility in employment and public life. Maysoon Zaid, who is Muslim and has cerebral palsy, became a comedian and established the New York Arab-American Comedy Festival. A motivational quote from each woman concludes each single-page profile. On the facing pages, Patkau’s vibrant, realistic illustrations spotlight the subjects’ accomplishments: Canadian singer/songwriter Christa Couture, who lost a leg to bone cancer and is of mixed Cree and Scandinavian heritage, appears with a guitar; wheelchair user Zhang Haidi, the head organizer of the 2022 Chinese Paralympians, reads a document as an amputee athlete skis in the background. Noting that a newly disabled adult “asks many questions that a [disabled] child wouldn’t ask,” the author refreshingly explains that congenital disabilities are experienced differently from those acquired later.

An eclectic, accessible, and upbeat introduction to accomplished disabled women. (Collective biography. 7-10)

Kirkus Reviews