Blind main characters

[shanaqui]

Can anyone recommend me books with blind main (or at least significant) characters? I think I know of one-and-a-half: Stephen Lawhead's Paradise War trilogy has Tegid, and in Ursula Le Guin's Gifts, Orrec is voluntarily and temporarily "blinded". I'd prefer books where the blindness isn't magically hand-waved away: it's real, and it gets in the way, and the protagonist learns to deal with it. I don't mind about being born blind, being blinded by violence or illness, or slowly going blind with age.

Comments

[boundbooks]

N.K. Jemisin's The Broken Kingdoms' protagonist is blind. I quite enjoyed the book, as well. It's epic fantasy and well-written. It's the second in a trilogy, and while you don't at all need to read the books in order to enjoy the second one (they have different protagonists and take place ten years apart), I'd recommend the series as a whole. Jemisin has also written about why her character is blind, and the ways in which she tried to write her, and the ways in which she wishes she could have done a better job: (Warning: Likely contains spoilers for the first and second books) Why is Oree Shoth blind?

The Broken Kingdoms: "In the city of Shadow, beneath the World Tree, alleyways shimmer with magic and godlings live hidden among mortalkind. Oree Shoth, a blind artist, takes in a strange homeless man on an impulse. This act of kindness engulfs Oree in a nightmarish conspiracy. Someone, somehow, is murdering godlings, leaving their desecrated bodies all over the city. And Oree’s guest is at the heart of it…"

[shanaqui]

Hee, I love N.K. Jemisin's work.

[boundbooks]

Yay! Glad you've found her, then. I'm really looking forward to the last book in the series. :D

[shanaqui]

Me tooo. Which makes me wonder if I've preordered it yet...