The DRM Guide to Disability Resources on the Internet: Sponsors

	DISABILITY RESOURCES ONLINE
	Monitoring, Reviewing and Reporting on Resources For Independent Living
	Updated 11/2005
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Home Bound: Growing Up With A Disability in America
by Cass Irvin
Temple University Press, 2004. Softcover, 223 pp., $19.95.
Mention the word "polio" to people in developed countries and I would wager that most of them would be hard pressed to really define the disease, let alone place it within a sociopolitical context. Not so Cass Irvin. The author of Home Bound: Growing Up With A Disability in America, herself a polio survivor, defines polio in all its manifestations in her long-anticipated memoir.
Paralyzed in one of the last epidemics, Irvin chronicles her life as a quadriplegic survivor and disability rights activist, writing of her stay at Warm Springs for rehabilitation, her family and personal turmoils, and growing activism within the women's and disability rights movements.

Reminiscent of works by other polio survivors like Anne Finger and Hugh Gregory Gallagher, Cass Irvin has, in Homebound, managed to simultaneously provide excellent historical background and fresh, current insights. Highly recommended!

-Reviewed by Sally Rosenthal


About the reviewer: A former college librarian and occupational therapist, Sally Rosenthal lives in Philadelphia with her husband Sandy who is a polio survivor, her guide dog Boise, and their rescued cat Toby.