The story follows Marguerite, who seems to be doing pretty well for 27 years old. She's got a regular job to pay the bills; she's been living with her boyfriend for the past two years; they have a dog and multiple cats; she has a circle of friends and relatives she spends time with. She does have her challenges, though. She's introverted enough that many of her coworkers think of her as cold; she can get over-stimulated in crowded areas; she gets frazzled pretty easily when something unexpected comes up. None of this seems particularly delibitating or anything, but it can make things awkward for her and often inconvenient for others. She eventually starts Googling her symptoms and realizes that she sees a lot of herself in the descriptions of autistic people. She consults a couple doctors, and eventually gets a formal diagnosis, which she takes as a great relief as she now has an explanation for her seemingly atypical thoughts and feelings. She embraces the autism label and begins deliberately changing pretty much all aspects of her life to accomodate or, better yet, cater to her new-found sense of self. This includes radically changing -- even eliminating -- many of her relationships as well as quitting her job in favor of becoming an advocate for autism awareness, eventually leading to the writing of this book!
The story does a good job of showcasing how a person can get well into adulthood without knowing or understanding how they might be autistic. A lot of stereotypes and caricatures keep many people from even considering it as a possible explanation. Marguerite frequently hears "... but you look me in the eye" as a response when telling people. Several of the people in Marguerite's "support group" weren't diagnosed until they were in their late 30s or 40s; one guy made it to 50. It is a spectrum after all and not everyone manifests the same behaviors in the same ways. This is emphasized by Marguerite's own diagnosis taking two full months as her doctors sorted through all the various options.
I have met and worked with a number of people over the years who have had various neuroatypical behaviors. Some had a formal diagnosis which was explicitly told to me, some seemed to have a formal diagnosis but only spoke to it obliquely, and others either didn't even know or knew and chose not to share that information but their behavior was consistent with others I've encountered. Of those that expressly mentioned it, ADHD has been most commonly cited. And the point of my saying that is part of why it seems a bit odd to discuss this book in 2025. The landscape has changed pretty significantly over the past decade -- for a direct example, author Julie Dachez was originally diagnosed with Asperger syndrome, which is no longer professionally used/recognized in favor of simply saying that a person is on the autism spectrum. It seems to me that the autism activism that Dachez and others have done has worked incredibly well in regards to bringing more knowledge and general awareness of what autism is and how people with it are often forced to navigate in a very neurotypical world.
But on the other hand (and good grief, I literally sighed in exasperation as I started typing this) then we have assipes like R.F. Kennedy Jr. who's going around using an unearned platform he's wildly undeserving of to disseminate completely absurd and wholly unsubstanitated claims about the causes of autism. Claims that are so far beyond wrong that I won't dignify them enough by repeating them here. And, as much as I hate that this is the case, but there are people who will listen to these cruel-for-the-sake-of-cruelty claims and take them at face value because someone in a position of political authority -- though by no means intellectual, scientific, or ethical authority -- verbalized them. So maybe someone who believes his lies will see this latest release of Invisible Differences and learn a little about what autism actually is. (There is, at the end of the book, an excellent summary guide for "Understanding Autism.")
I won't get into the technical aspects of the storytelling, how Dachez and illustrator Mademoiselle Caroline handle things from a strictly comics production perspective. Suffice it to say that the 2020 edition was nominated for an Eisner Award for Best Reality-Based Work. The talent is there.
The paperback version of Invisible Differences came out last month from Oni Press. It retails for $19.99 US, and it should be available from your favorite bookstore.
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