Description Two eyes, two arms, two legs. I'm perfectly ordinary. But the moment I open my mouth, people see me differently — as a stutterer who seems somehow lacking. No matter how slow, how funny-sounding, or how halting my speech may be, I'm going to say what I want to say, all the way to the end. Because what you say matters more than how you say it. Winner of the 2014 Newbery Honor Award Rising above a visible disability to discover one's true self! The 2014 Newbery Honor winner I Am a Stutterer Who Loves to Talk follows Victor, a boy who has avoided people because of his stutter, as he learns to speak with confidence without being crushed by others' judgment. Told through the eyes of a thirteen-year-old boy with deep insight and understanding into human nature, this novel is also the autobiographical story of author Vince Vawter, who has lived joyfully(!) as a stutterer for over sixty years. Victor, the only child of a wealthy family, wants for nothing — but he agrees to take over his friend's newspaper delivery route for one month. As a boy famous on his baseball team for his powerful fastball, throwing papers onto porches is a piece of cake for Victor. The real challenge is collecting payments every Friday, a task that keeps him up at night with worry, since the moment he opens his mouth and starts to stutter, people often assume he's slow. But as Victor begins to connect with the people on his route, he starts to change, little by little. Especially after meeting Mr. Spiro, a knowledgeable and warm-hearted man, Victor begins to truly want to have conversations. Through these small connections, Victor slowly comes to understand who he really is — not a boy defined by a speech impediment, but simply Victor: a boy who loves baseball, writes poetry, and dreams of becoming a newspaper reporter. I Am a Stutterer Who Loves to Talk is not a story about overcoming a disability through tearful effort to achieve a triumphant cure. Rather, it's a moving tale that shows how, even when a disability cannot be fixed, it can be overcome — and that the strength to do so begins with facing and loving who you truly are. "Why do you stutter and no one else does? It's the same reason no other kid can throw a fastball like you can!" A true understanding of disability as simply 'difference' changes a boy's life! Before his paper route, the only person Victor truly connects with is Mam, the Black housekeeper who has been part of his family since he was six. While Mam has long given Victor emotional comfort and helped him build his defenses, it's not until he begins having deep conversations with the bookish Mr. Spiro that Victor truly begins to awaken to his own identity. "Most adults, especially relatives and my parents' friends, wouldn't let me finish trying to say something — they'd act like they already knew what I meant. Sometimes an adult would even finish my sentence for me. But when I heard what they said, it usually wasn't what I meant to say at all. Some adults would put on a fake smile and look away while waiting for the words to come out of my mouth. Others would just hurry off." — pp. 69–70 Victor knows the adults around him don't mean any harm. But pretending not to notice his stutter, or treating him as though he doesn't exist, is, in its own way, a denial of who he is. Unlike these adults, Mam — who helped Victor survive countless hurts — and Mr. Spiro — who gave him the strength to stop being hurt — both share one thing in common: they accepted Victor exactly as he was. The learned Mr. Spiro goes a step further than Mam, teaching Victor that a disability isn't a sign of being lesser than others, but simply another form of being different. It's a story that reminds us, once again, of the timeless truth that what matters is not outward appearance, but the true self within. A thoughtful look at those who are overlooked and hurting Having been consumed by his own pain for so long, Victor finally begins to look outward, toward the people around him, as he delivers newspapers. And what he sees are others just as overlooked and hurting as he is: Mam, who faces systemic discrimination because she is Black; Mrs. Washington, who drowns her loneliness in drink due to a lack of connection; and a boy who watches television all day, practicing how to read lips…