Nowhere Girl


ADHD is currently being recognized as being a problem that is not just something for young middle-class white boys. White women and girls, and people of a variety of ethnicities, also have these issues.

Ciccone’s narration about her life with ADHD is more than just a confession of messy housekeeping or disorganization because ADHD has further reaching origins and consequences than that. It is a disorder with roots in neurological functioning. She openly shares her experiences and opinions.

How she deals with the challenges of motherhood, having ADHD etc. makes a gripping story.

This book merges memoir and science, weaving the author’s personal journey with broader research on ADHD, especially how gender bias has long masked symptoms in girls. This blend keeps the narrative engaging and accessible, avoiding purely clinical language.

The book traces the author’s life from childhood through growing up, becoming a mother, trying various medications, and learning to love herself. The author specifically talks about their therapy experience going back and forgiving or helping their younger selves heal. This is very much how this book read, as an exploration and processing of how ADHD was present and could have been addressed throughout the author’s life if diagnosed properly earlier.

This book is highly relatable and deeply moving, including likely familiar experiences for most as this spans from childhood to age 40. This is also recent, so impacts like COVID isolation are also included in the discussion. The way this memoir blends memoir with science makes these complex topics emotionally approachable.

Overall, I applaud the author’s ability to share their experience and struggles so transparently and the research they brought into their memoir. I think this is an educational and relatable read, especially for the “nowhere girls” who grew up unseen. If you appreciate heartfelt memoirs that illuminate overlooked aspects of mental health, this is a great read to offer both intellectual insight and emotional resonance.

I received a copy for review. All opinions are my own. This is a MUST read for any woman with ADHD. Finally a book that shows what it’s like for us and an up close look at how the author navigated her own life before and after diagnosis. There was a lot of good information and facts included in this book. The stories and struggles of the author made me feel much less alone. I am so grateful this book exists!

I like nonfiction books that deal with mental health. Nowhere Girl is a well written account about ADHD, but unfortunately, suffers from repetition. This book needed to be more precise and shorter in length. I think the subject matter is a very important topic for a book, but after the halfway point, I felt like the rest of the narrative dragged. The author did a great job outlining what the symptoms are for ADHD. I don’t suffer from the disorder, but I have a family member who does, and she was misdiagnosed in her early teens. Very informative book, but needed an editor.

2.5 ⭐ rounded up to 3

I was super excited for this one and initially while reading I kept that same excitement, but the more I read it the less I cared to keep going. While I did relate to some of the things she spoke about, I think it was overall a bit too unrelatable for me, but that isn't why the low atr staying as that's a me problem not a memoor problem. I'm sure some people will relate to this one super well and love it though!

I think I just thought it felt a bit klunky the more I kept reading. I also felt like I kept waiting for more that just never came. Felt a bit too short for my liking and I felt underwhelmes by it.

I think this could be very helpful for people in similar situationa as Carla or people that don't a lot about ADHD

This was a great and informative read. Not only does it provide information on ADHD, it does so in a refreshing and easy to read way that provides solidarity. As a librarian, I see great value in adding this book to the collection. As a woman with ADHD, I greatly appreciated the effort put into this book to relate experiences, symptoms, and emotional life challenges to an often missed diagnosed area in women. I will highly recommend this to women with similar experiences to myself.

Thank you so much to @randomhouseca and @netgalley for the advanced copy of "Nowhere Girl: Life as a Member of ADHD's Lost Generation" which will be published on September 9th, 2025. September 9th is also my birthday, I was also diagnosed with ADHD at 40, so I am a serendipitous card carrying member of the "lost generation." There are many places where I felt very connected to Ciccone, and our similarities jaw-dropping. But I think any overachiever, talks too much Canadian gal who grew up in the 90s would feel the same way. Ciccone provides a good mix of her own experience with information about ADHD, making the whole book very palatable. She also explores the history of women’s mental healthcare and the pressure to perform our gender in a certain way, in molds we can't and don't always fit into. I learned a lot about my recent diagnosis, including somethings about myself that sure do make a whole lot of sense, like how I have always been a klutz but that people with ADHD have "impaired proprioception" which means we are less aware of how our bodes fit in any given space. Ding ding! How about the "otherhood", meaning we are always ready to judge ourselves against everyone else, ding a ling! Or the part about the travel to avoid reality, but what is reality anyways? Lots to chew on for sure, and more to learn about yourself, if you too have ADHD and are working on acceptance and understanding.

Carla Ciccone's book offers an insightful blend of memoir and non-fiction, providing a powerful look into her life with ADHD, particularly as a woman of color. Her personal stories resonate deeply, highlighting the challenges faced by women in getting diagnosed and treated for ADHD. Ciccone's candid reflections on her experiences, combined with interviews and research, make this book both relatable and informative. The book also sheds light on the unique struggles of BIPOC individuals with ADHD, adding an important perspective to the conversation. It's a valuable read for anyone looking to understand ADHD better, especially those who have lived with it without a diagnosis.

I appreciate the deft weaving of personal experience with research and cultural studies about ADHD. It is stigmatized, ignored, undertreated in women and girls. Informative & a powerful antidote to shame.

A memoir by f a woman diagnosed with ADHD in adulthood but looking back on her overlooked symptoms throughout her life. Commentary on women’s health and researched information about ADHD and the history of diagnosing of the condition woven in.

I really enjoyed this one so much because as someone who just became aware of her neurodivergence, everything started to make sense. Ciccone's own experiences in her youth align with my own and I felt so seen. As a Black woman, I was very thankful that she consistently mentioned how the BIPOC neurodivergent experience is even more different and has the capacity to be isolating, leading to more misunderstanding. As girls, we are socialized in ways that make it harder for ADHD to be diagnosed and this really reflects more of how society has failed us women and girls.

Really enjoyed reading this! It was very informative while also being palatable. I learned a lot and will definitely be rereading in the future. Would highly recommend to anyone with ADHD, particularly women diagnosed later in life.

Wish I could have heard more from the Nowhere Girls that the author interviewed.

Part memoir, part non-fiction this book reflects back on Carla Ciccone's childhood and teenage years before she was diagnosed with ADHD. She struggled with the usual symptoms, but because it was the 90s, her symptoms weren't recognized. She detailed additional struggles she had in adulthood until she received a diagnosis and medication. This was not the happy ending, tied up with a bow that one would think. Instead, she reflects on the way medicine makes her feel, and the way our society is set up in such a way that we have to take medicine just to keep the cogs moving.

Throughout the book she interviews or references prominent ADHD researchers and sheds light on some of the resources that I didn't even know were available, such as a coach for parents whose children are diagnosed with ADHD. She is based in Canada, so that may be specific to her area. However I really appreciated the reminder that exercise and fresh air can be as effective as medicine for those of us who are able to incorporate these into our day. When I am able to exercise regularly, I do see a difference.

I enjoyed this book and would like to read more.

i think this is an amazing read for anyone who has adhd, or anyone who would like to understand adhd better. ciccone blends personal experience with data masterfully as she paints a picture of the differences that women experience when it comes to receiving and ADHD diagnosis and living with it.

ciccone doesn’t sugar coat things at all as she outlines her own personal struggles, the disparities between diagnoses in girls and boys, and the issues that most people with adhd face. as someone with adhd i really saw myself in this book as i was reading it. it was a very raw and truthful examination into some of the experiences that women have with adhd. ciccone also highlights the comorbidity between adhd and other disorders such as ocd, autism, and other learning disorders.

i think that any woman with an adhd diagnosis would feel very seen reading this book and i think that those who don’t have adhd could learn a lot (beyond what’s in the dsm) about adhd and the actual experiences that people have with ADHD

Technically I don't like to rate non-fiction books, but I did absolutely devour this one and found it to be very informative in all sorts of different ways. As someone who always felt like I had ADHD but also was not formally diagnosed until post-uni/my early to mid-20s, I found this book highly relatable, with many of the experiences and realizations brought to light by Ciccone resonating with me. Highly rec this book just as a great (though perhaps somewhat niche?) non-fiction read to those who are interested, and most especially to those who, like myself and Ciccone, grappled with their own ADHD on their own before being officially diagnosed.

This was a book that I desperately needed to read. It came at such a great time because I’m currently navigating the reality of being neurodivergent and having this be my reality now at almost thirty. It feel like I’m in mourning, for who I could’ve been if I would’ve received the help that I so desperately needed when I was younger.

But as Ciccone points out, society has socialized girls in a way that doesn’t really give us a fighting chance nor a way to receive a diagnosis early on. While reading this, I found myself doing some personal excavation because what Ciccone talked about eerily mirrored my experience as an undiagnosed ADHD young Black girl . I had received my diagnoses for depression and anxiety but I feel like the one that I needed the most, the acknowledgment of my ADHD was so far out of reach and Ciccone talks about how far out of reach it is for so many of us Nowhere girls.

Besides how inclusive and informative this memoir was, I’m thankful that Ciccone says the only way to have any actual change because just purely handing out ADHD diagnoses to girls, women, and femmes is true societal restructuring. Capitalism is neurotypical she says, which means that those of us who are neurodivergent were always going to “fail” because we were set up to. This is how it was designed.

I’m very grateful to have read this and I hope that other Nowhere girls feel seen and find reading this cathartic.