When sound started leaching from my world at age thirteen, I was terrified. The me that I knew and was more or less comfortable with, within typical thirteen-year-old parameters, was morphing against my will into some entirely other me, and I had no idea who that would be.
Between the lack of role models in real life and the lack of accurate and authentic representation on the screen or the page, all I felt was the loss of my old identity – I didn’t know what my new identity as a deaf person could be. Representation matters. Seeing myself in a book or a movie could have made such a huge difference, and I am have written the book that could have made that difference. Both for myself as someone who was so desperately trying to find a new normal, and as something to give to the many people around me who might have been well-meaning but who didn’t have the slightest idea how to interact with me.
SIGNS & PORTENTS is a Young Adult novel that took shape during my monthlong residency at the Anderson Center in Red Wing and which is currently (spring 2023) undergoing hopefully-final revisions.
jennafischtrombea.com 
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