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Oliver likes the sound of flushing toilets, garbage trucks and eating yoghurt. His dislikes include the smell of Vegemite, which can trigger a screaming meltdown that lasts for hours. As his 11-year-old sister, Matilda, tells readers of the fictional children’s novel The Thing About Oliver, sometimes he bites people. Oliver has autism.
Deborah Kelly’s 2019 novel was shortlisted for the Children’s Book Council of Australia’s and Speech Pathology Australia’s book of the year. It won the Australian Association of Family Therapy book of the year and generates a weekly stream of fan mail from teachers and students in Australia and overseas.
The novel is dedicated to the so-called glass children, like Oliver’s sister Matilda, who are the sometimes overlooked siblings of those with chronic illnesses, disabilities, or mental health conditions. It was included among public schools’ English curriculum support material as an option for teachers.
And that is when the problems started.
In February last year, Square Peg Round Whole, an advocacy group made up of parents and carers of neurodivergent and disabled children, wrote to the head of the NSW Education Standards Authority, saying the book was undignified, outdated and damaging.
“[Members] have expressed distress over the book’s portrayal of autistic children, which reinforces harmful stereotypes and presents autistic individuals as burdens on their families,” the group’s co-national co-ordinators, Liz Ridgeway and Symone Wheatley-Hey, wrote.
They also said some children had avoided going to school because their class was studying the text.
“We understand that the author is not autistic, and nor does she have autistic children. If this is true, it is very concerning that the book was published at all, to be blunt.”
In an online forum dedicated to discussing the novel, there were more complaints. “I’m autistic and find it abhorrent,” one person said. Others defended the book.
The NSW Department of Education removed the unit of work in April 2025 for “review and remediation” and another book was put in its place. The curriculum support material was rewritten and another book was used.
Author Deborah Kelly said she was never officially notified of the decision to remove the work but found out through word of mouth. She said she was never approached by the Department of Education to inquire about her lived experience with autism.
“I was deeply saddened to learn that this group has been offended by my book and want to remove it from schools where I know it is facilitating a love of reading and understanding of difference and diversity,” she said.
“This was a deeply personal book of 10 years in the making, and a tapestry of so many people and places I know and love. I was very mindful of being respectful and consulted with many families and also health professionals during the writing process.”
Kelly, who works in healthcare where most of her patients are neurodiverse, said she wanted to be respectful of the privacy of those who informed the book’s characters.
“There are neurodivergent people in my immediate family who helped inspire its characters but out of respect for their privacy I have never discussed this publicly,” she said.
“Almost all of Oliver’s traits and behaviours were based on those of neurodivergent people I know and love. I know I took the greatest of care to ensure the portrayal of my characters was honest, sensitive and dignified.”
President of the Primary English Teaching Association of Australia, Dr Helen Adam, said she believed the broader issue was a lack of children’s books by authors with a disability.
“It is absolutely unrealistic, and frankly unfair, to expect any single text to represent every perspective perfectly,” she said.
“I don’t support removing a book, but I do support asking much harder questions about the ecosystem of texts we place around any single title.”
She said teachers were trained to teach literacy, interrogate texts, ask whose voice is present and whose is absent, and think about why.
Square Peg Round Whole’s Wheatley-Hey said many teachers and parent members of their organisation had contacted them about the book.
“Our advocacy was not directed towards Ms Kelly, for whom we have the utmost respect, but towards the obligation of NESA and the department to ensure curriculum materials, including fictional texts, represent disability in a way that centres lived experience,” she said.
She said the UN’s Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities requires governments to actively combat stereotypes and promote respect and dignity of people with disability, including by fostering these attitudes from an early age and encouraging responsible representation in education and media.
A NSW Department of Education spokesman said: “The department is committed to ensuring curriculum support materials are inclusive, respectful and appropriate for all students.”
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