But You Look So Normal: Lost and Found in a Hearing World

2024 IPPY Awards Gold Winner in Best First Book (Nonfiction/Personal)

By age four, Claudia Marseille had hardly uttered a word. When her parents finally had her hearing tested and learned she had a severe hearing loss, they chose to mainstream her, hoping this would offer her the most “normal” childhood possible. With the help of a primitive hearing aid, Claudia worked hard to learn to hear, lipread, and speak even as she tried to hide her disability in order to fit in. As a result, she was often misunderstood, lonely, and isolated—fitting into neither the hearing world nor the Deaf culture.

This memoir explores Claudia’s relationships with her German refugee parents—a disturbed, psychoanalyst father obsessed over various harebrained projects and moneymaking schemes and a Jewish mother who had survived the Holocaust in Munich—and with her own identity. Claudia shares how she emerged from loneliness and social isolation, explored her Jewish identity, struggled to find a career compatible with hearing loss, and eventually opened herself to a life of creativity and love.

But You Look So Normal is the inspiring story of a life affected but not defined by an invisible disability. It is a journey through family, loss, shame, identity, love, and healing as Claudia finally, joyfully, finds her place in the world.

After earning master’s degrees in archaeology and in public policy, and finally an MFA, Claudia Marseille developed a career in photography and painting, a profession compatible with a hearing loss. She ran a fine art portrait photography studio for fifteen years before becoming a full-time painter; her paintings are now represented by a gallery in Mill Valley, California. In her free time Claudia loves to read, watch movies, travel, spend time with friends, attend concerts and art exhibits, and play classical piano. Learn more about her art at www.claudiamarseille.com and more about her writing at www.claudiamarseilleauthor.com. She and her husband live in Oakland, California, and have one grown daughter.