CINCINNATI — Cory Campbell was looking for a book. She can’t find it.
“This is bad,” she said. “I’m getting so distracted.”
So she started humming.
“Ah, here we go,” Campbell said, before pulling the book off the library shelf.
It’s the second one she's read in a new book club at the Cincinnati and Hamilton County Public Library.
“It made my brain happy,” she said.
It wasn't so much about the book. It was about the people Campbell read it with.
“When you get to the book club," she said, "it feels like coming home."
Because it's a book club for people like her — people with autism, ADHD or other types of neurodivergence. Basically, it’s for people whose brains work a little differently.
WATCH: It sometimes makes them nauseous to talk to people. See how a book club helps.
“The rest of the world is not really designed for people whose minds work differently," said Amanda Van Mil, another book club member. "It can be really exhausting."
Doctors diagnosed Van Mil with ADHD about two years ago, when she was 38, after she recognized symptoms found in her children.
“I feel sad for the time I lost not knowing who I was — or why I was the way I am — but it’s also been really affirming,” she said. “There’s nothing wrong with me. There aren’t all these little pieces of me that need to be fixed. They’re just characteristics of who I am.”
Michelle Thompson is the downtown library’s customer adviser. She started the book club because employees saw neurodivergent adults being underserved.
“It’s one of the things this community needs the most — social connection, feeling like they fit in somewhere,” Thompson says. “And that’s kind of what happened on day one — instant connections.”
This week, some of the members got together. And when they saw each other, Van Mil bragged that she wasn’t late. Then, they shared pictures of their pets. And laughed.
Of course, they also talked about books.
“It feels good to be with that group of people,” Van Mil said.
Those people include Campbell, who said she got divorced after finding out she may have autism as an adult. She moved back to Cincinnati to be closer to family.
To start over.
“It’s a depressing story,” she said. “But I like to think of it as a hopeful story.”
In part, because of the book club.
“This is my starting over time — where I get to figure out who I am, what I need, what my brain needs,” Campbell said. “And I get to do that in a community here with people whose brains are a little bit different, too.”
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WANT TO JOIN?
The library says newcomers are always welcome. The group meets once a month in the main library downtown. For more information, visit the library’s website. There are a number of other book clubs, as well.
