“Mommy! Look! “That man doesn’t have a hand!”
From hiding out from small children in the grocery store to staying numb with drugs and alcohol, Emile Barrios spent years running away from what he saw as the central truth of his life: that he was a second-class human being, punished by God at birth with a missing hand and foot. Even though his Outside Me was funny, smart and charming, the shameful Inside Me was always there, waiting for someone to discover. After years of failures, wrecked relationships and crushing loneliness, he came to an astonishing realization: his real handicap was not at the end of his arm – but in his head. And until he took responsibility for his life and stopped playing the victim, nothing was going to change.
An even more astonishing revelation followed: that his “unique” struggle with a handicap was something that almost everyone shares.
“An engaging and heartening story, with universal appeal. If life is a big honking puzzle – and it is – Barrios reminds us that we’re all born with pieces missing.”
– Jincy Willett
author of Winner of the National Book Award
