When is a difference not such a difference in children’s literature?

Have you ever revisited classic stories from your childhood? How many featured disabled or different characters? I’d wager very few and that those that did likely portrayed them in problematic ways.

My childhood standouts are The Secret Garden, Heidi, Pollyanna, and Dee. If you know the first three classics, you’ll recognise that, despite their enduring charm, they frame disability as a temporary moral hurdle – something that can be overcome through nature, willpower, or miracle cures. And, like most stories from that era, disability and difference are central to the plot rather than incidental. 

Thankfully, portrayal in children’s literature has undergone a sea change over the years.  Tragedy tropes and inspiration porn have been replaced with protagonists who have agency, nuance, and lives beyond their disability or difference.

Dusti Bowling’s Insignificant Events in the Life of a Cactus  is among several stories worth taking a moment to consider. Her protagonist, Aven, is born without arms yet navigates challenges in a new town with sharp wit, resourcefulness and zero self-pity. She roller-skates, cracks jokes, and faces adventures on her own terms. Bowling’s positive representation expertly encourages young readers to see disability as merely one facet of an extraordinary character.

For incidental diversity, The Moonlight Zoo by Maudie Powell-Tuck is a gem. The main character in this picture book wears a hearing aid which is never mentioned in the text. It’s a simple story (with sumptuous illustrations) about finding a lost cat, allowing children to see diversity as a natural, accepted part of everyday life.

And for own-voice representation, Cerrie Burnell’s Wilder Than Midnight offers a powerful perspective. Rather than centring her main character’s limb difference, Burnell pivots to her courage, cunning, and affinity for magic as she grows into a fierce, wolf-raised heroine.

Achieving this balance of positivity, normalcy and authenticity can be something of a tightrope for authors, especially non-own-voice authors like myself. In my middle-grade novel, A Sequence of Cosmic Accidents, the main character, Arian, was inspired by a dear childhood friend with an upper limb difference. My goal from the outset was to ensure that Arian’s ‘difference’ didn’t define him or his story – just as it never defined my friend.

I was lucky to be able to consult with individuals at Reach who were instrumental in helping shape Arian into an authentic multi-dimensional twelve-year-old boy, albeit one who faces extraordinary situations. He summons portals, evades foes, and protects his friends on his journey to becoming a ‘typical’ hero – brave, flawed and crucially relatable. His courage, integrity, and above all kindness as a friend are (I hope) what move readers emotionally and morally to be inspired by him.

While Arian is enmeshed in cosmic stakes, his foster sister in the story, Madlock, becomes the focal point for stares and comments regarding her strangeness. From the moment she arrives on Arian’s doorstep, revealing herself as an alien fugitive from a magical world, Madlock seizes the spotlight for ‘otherness’ in the narrative, diverting attention away from Arian. Madlock, however, draws attention not for a visible trait but for her very essence.

Her contrasting journey touches on themes of acceptance and judging others too quickly, providing a powerful reminder of how important it is to try and understand people, even when they initially seem completely ‘different’.

Part of being an author is touring schools with my book and presenting it. I always wait until the final Powerpoint slide to show Arian’s image. I’m yet to visit a school where no child has a visible or audible reaction seeing him. That reaction is so telling. After hearing of Arian’s great adventures and exploits, they were not expecting someone ‘different’ to be the hero and certainly not expecting to be informed of his ‘difference’ at the end of the presentation. But this choice is deliberate on my part. Arian’s limb difference is no more relevant to the story than the colour of his eyes, so why would I mention it earlier? I hope the children pick up on this too.

To finish where we started – when is a difference not such a difference in children’s literature? Having all the aforementioned elements is key, but for it to be impactful it has to be at scale. Though there has been a sea change in our approach to writing disabled and different characters, the number of books out there would barely fill a puddle.

In 2024, seven books out of the 2,721 titles surveyed in the UK featured a disabled main character. How does this measly figure make sense when contrasted against the 1.8 million children in the UK estimated to have a disability? It doesn’t.

If you want to support change in how children with differences and disabilities are portrayed in literature and consequently their lives, start by supporting the authors writing about them.

You can buy or borrow their books, but the most impactful action is to leave reviews. It is those reviews that can propel a story up the Amazon, Goodreads, Waterstones and others charts, creating demand for more inclusive stories, until the positive content in those stories enter the zeitgeist and spark meaningful change in the real world.

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S.A Reyhani is the author of A Sequence of Cosmic Accidents, a National Book Tokens top pick for children’s books in 2025 and featuring a main character with an upper limb difference. Described as a “Funny, wild, crazily imaginative debut” by the Guardian, her book is available in shops and online.