Girl in the Window — The Disability Thriller you didn’t know YA was missing

“No one sees me. I am a ghost. I am invisible.”

When Kasia, a teenage girl housebound with ME witnesses what appears to be an abduction from her bedroom window, she immediately calls the police. What follows is a remarkable story of mystery, intrigue, and resilience that will be familiar to anyone with a chronic illness, and everyone who’s ever wondered what goes on behind the locked doors on their street.

Kasia is a complex and sympathetic character, and author Penny Joelson — an ME patient herself — has done an incredible job of describing an illness that so often leaves its sufferers isolated and ignored. And while a book in which the protagonist spends most of her time trapped in her bedroom doesn’t sound like it could be fast-paced, that’s exactly what this story is.

Kasia is an observant and endlessly curious patient, and while she might have been removed from the world outside, she certainly doesn’t let it pass her by. When she sees the curtains move in the house opposite, and the face of a girl materialises at the window, she’s desperate to reach out to someone as isolated as she is.

But the adults in the house say that the girl doesn’t exist.