A little over six years ago, my first book came out. I’d previously broken ties with another publisher because they wanted a different book than I was capable of writing, and I had almost given up. It’s only thanks to Aafke, who urged me to email other publishers, that I sent an unfinished manuscript and a self-made cover to three of them. “They’ll all say no, but at least I’ll have tried, and Aafke and my conscience will stop nagging me,” I figured. Things turned out differently. Myrthe from Blossom Books replied enthusiastically right away, and not long after, I signed my contract. They even let me keep my cover.

I poured my heart and soul into the book. I didn’t expect anything at first, but I was still going to make this book incredible; it would be the autism bible. The voice that was desperately needed then, and still is. Sometimes it was a battle with my editor and with final boss Myrthe herself, but that’s part of the process. This had to be the best book ever.

Now, I’m a bit of a control freak, so one morning in March 2019, I took the train with Fleur from the publishing house to the printer. We were going to review the proofs on-site so I could make absolutely sure the cover would be the right shade of pink. Fleur told me the team had been a little nervous about the book. It was a new kind of book for them, and they weren’t sure if anyone would be interested. “How many people actually have autism?” Myrthe once asked. “One or two percent of the Dutch population,” according to Google. “So over 200,000 people. And they’ve got family too…” It’s not like we were expecting to strike gold. Myrthe just wanted to know if there would be enough interest to sell the 2,000 copies of the first print.

Well, that went better than expected. In fact, the first print run sold so quickly that a second run had to be rushed. And since that one wouldn’t be ready in time, they also did a short print run through Centraal Boekhuis, who print the books in-house. (Those editions are easy to spot because they don’t have flaps.) Then came a third print run, a fourth, a fifth… I think we’re at eleven now. I’ve kinda lost count.

Suddenly, I was a “well-known autistic,” someone who gave autism a face. I was invited on the radio and on TV. People were happy to see me, because I challenged the stereotypes. A woman! Not this guy named Kees (the previous face of autism in The Netherlands)! Although after a while, some people got tired of me too. “Toeps again? Let someone else have a turn!” And honestly, I get it. I’m just one person, and I could never represent the full range of autistic experiences. But also: this is just how media works. They’ve got a digital rolodex, do a quick Google search, or follow me on social media. When they need someone to deliver a few soundbites during Autism Awareness Week, it’s simply convenient to call me. If I can’t or don’t want to do it, I’m always happy to suggest others. But I’m not Mother Teresa either. I want to sell my book, and media appearances help with that.

So yeah, that first book did well, and I started dreaming bigger. Every now and then people would ask if there would be an English translation, because it would be helpful for relative X or friend Y. “No idea,” I’d always reply. “That’s not up to me.” Normally, it works like this: a foreign publisher sees the book at a book fair or something, hears it’s doing well, and then buys the rights. (In practice, it’s usually not a one-time purchase, but a deal where the Dutch author and publisher get a percentage of the sales.) That’s a bit tricky as a Dutch writer, of course, since the book is in Dutch. An English publisher can’t read that. So if you want to sell it to them, you’ll need to have it translated first. And that costs money.

“Can’t you just do it yourself?” people asked. “Sure, I can, but…” I always thought self-published books were a bit sad. I associated them with anti-vax nutters who had bundled their ramblings into a disaster of a book, complete with Comic Sans and color combos that burn your eyes on the cover. Plus, you don’t have the foreign publisher’s network, so your book probably won’t end up in stores.

“But you do keep more of the profits!” I crunched the numbers and wow, they were right. While a foreign publisher might give you about 5% of the retail price per book, self-publishing could get you over 50%. “Can’t you crowdfund it?” people asked. Okay, I was convinced. I decided to become a publisher, acquired the rights to my own book—which means I pay royalties to Blossom Books every year, and they pass them back to me after taking their cut. I launched a crowdfunding campaign to pay for a professional translator, editor, designer, and marketing campaign, and then…

BAM. Pandemic.

Now, the pandemic sucked in every possible way for my personal life: my move to Japan was delayed by fourteen months, I was basically homeless during that time, and the stress nearly broke me. But to be fair, it was amazing for my book. But you don’t look autistic at all launched in July 2020. The book was available worldwide via print-on-demand, or as an ebook download. The fact that it wasn’t in bookstores? Totally fine—they were closed anyway! (Though this did hurt sales of Ik ben autastisch!, the kids’ edition that came out in October 2020.)

For about a year, sales of my English book quietly trickled along. Getting the book on the map turned out to be harder than I’d expected without a publisher backing me. But now and then I sent copies to autism-related organizations or influencers, and my readers told their international friends about it. And then things started to pick up! My book was being recommended, reviewed, and added to lists (think: “The top 10 must-read autism books!”).

For the short Kickstarter video I once made, I’d hired a voice-over artist via Fiverr, and you all turned out to love her voice, so I brought her back to narrate the full audiobook. Small hitch: by then she’d become a semi-famous actress and was charging a few thousand euros for the project. Pricey, but I wanted quality, so I said yes.

By now, I’ve sold over ten thousand English-language books, and my audiobook has earned more than twelve thousand dollars. So yeah, that investment in my fancy voice-over definitely paid off.

I already mentioned it briefly, but back in 2020 we were also working on a children’s adaptation: Ik ben autastisch! (English: I’m autastic!) I created this book together with children’s author Esther Walraven (because I have no clue how to write at a ten-year-old’s level, just to name one challenge) and illustrator Roozeboos.

After the success of my first book, we had high hopes for Ik ben autastisch! – even though autism doesn’t magically disappear when you grow up and there are actually more autistic adults, it’s still often seen as a “kid thing.” And now we had a kids’ book for that! But this time, the pandemic really messed things up. Bookstores were closed or only offered pickup, events were off the table, and books usually depend heavily on launch momentum. After that, your book is quickly seen as “old,” and dozens of new ones have already hit the shelves.

“Are you going to translate Ik ben autastisch! too?” people often asked. That was tricky. Aside from the fact that I’m not the only author (so profits would be split, making it less profitable to invest heavily), the book also contains illustrations, and it’s a hardcover. Unfortunately, print-on-demand doesn’t allow for the same quality finish, especially not with the cool, unique, reversible cover that the Dutch version has.

But! Just when no one was expecting it anymore, Ik ben autastisch! was nominated for the IBBY Outstanding Books for Young People with Disabilities 2025 collection. That means the book is currently traveling the world as part of an exhibition. So hey, foreign publishers! Come find us!

So, the pandemic ended and I finally moved to my beloved Japan. While all that was going on, I was also working on the German translation of Maar je ziet er helemaal niet autistisch uit, titled Aber du siehst gar nicht autistisch aus. “I can just pull off the same trick again!” I thought.

Crowdfunding, translation, promotion, bam! But yeah, that’s where things already started going wrong. Promotion had already been tricky in English, but in German it was nearly impossible. Not only is my German kind of shaky, I also had zero knowledge of the German autism scene. On top of that, just as I launched the German crowdfunding campaign, Japan reopened its borders. Suddenly I was swamped with moving, setting up my Japanese company, and dealing with all the administrative chaos that comes with relocating. The German book kind of ended up on the back burner. And by the time I had everything sorted and had my German-speaking assistant Olga email a bunch of magazines, they were no longer interested in a book that had come out a year earlier. As of now, around 700 copies of the German book have been sold. I still have a whole box of them at home, which I had shipped over after I stopped using Centraal Boekhuis for distribution. “We can destroy the remaining stock,” they said. “Hell no, send it to Japan!” I replied. Maybe one day I can donate them to German autism organizations—any ideas?

There’s also an Italian version of my book, by the way, but that one was actually picked up by a foreign publisher. They bought a photo from me, had a well-known Italian write a foreword, and I currently have no clue how many copies they’ve sold.

Last year, my most recent book came out: Deze autist ging naar Japan – en wat er toen gebeurde zal je verbazen (English: This autistic girl went to Japan – and you won’t believe what happened next). It’s about my move to Japan and how I handled that as an autistic person. When I signed the contract with Blossom Books, I made sure to secure the English rights. As soon as the book was finished, I got the translation started. I had more experience this time, so I was ready to crush it. This book was going to be just as much of a bestseller as the first one. Hey ho, let’s go!

But that’s not how it went. Thanks in part to the popularity of my first book, I did get quite a bit of press. Bookstores ordered big. Sounds great, but here’s the thing: they also have the right to return unsold copies, at my expense. And those books, which have sat on store shelves and are no longer in perfect condition, usually go straight into the shredder. Blossom Books does try to rescue them when possible and sells them as B-choice copies on their website or at book fairs. So, is the book a flop? No. According to Blossom Books, it’s a perfectly normal book. But “normal” does kind of feel like a flop after “the publisher’s best-selling non-fiction title ever.”

This autistic girl went to Japan has a bit of an identity crisis: Is it a book about autism, or a book about Japan? And what exactly is supposed to be so unbelievable? (It’s a nod to those clickbait titles from the 2000s, but not everyone gets the joke, or the irony: “An autistic person who loves Japan? I’m not surprised at all?”)

To answer that first question: the book is more about Japan than it is about autism. And Japan is super booming right now, so you’d think it would sell! But that audience might be put off by the word “autistic”—especially if they haven’t read my first book and still think you’re supposed to say “person with autism.” On the flip side, people looking for information about autism won’t find all that much of it here. I usually try to avoid reviews, but I know there are people who think the book sucks because I do things they wish they could do. “How can you be autistic?!” they seem to think.

Maybe I should have chosen a different title. Like “An Alien in Tokyo,” for example. Yeah, I know that’s already the title of a chapter in the first book, but hey, who cares? I wouldn’t be the first to change a book title after release. The women behind Damn, Honey (a famous feminist duo at Blossom Books) re-released their book Heb je nou al een vriend? (English: Do you have a boyfriend yet?) under the new title Shit waar je als vrouw mee moet dealen (English: Shit women have to deal with), because too many people thought it was about dating, when it was actually about feminism. Still, I find it tricky. Changing a title is a lot of work. It’s not just the book itself that changes (including the ISBN, which wipes out all your previous ratings), but also the cover, the ebook, and the audiobook all need to be updated. And would it actually help? You can’t really re-launch it, so maybe all that effort would be for nothing. What do you think?

One book that is definitely getting a new edition is Maar je ziet er helemaal niet autistisch uit. The title stays, because it’s great, but there were a few things that had been bothering me. So one day I texted Myrthe about it, and we decided it was time for a v2.

You might know that Maar je ziet er helemaal niet autistisch uit is the first book in the Hoofdzaken (English: Mind Matters) series. That wasn’t the plan from the start. I just had an idea for a book, and that was it. But then Francien released her book Druks (English: Dope), and Kathelijn came with her idea for Gevalletje Borderline (English: A Borderline Case). Kathelijn had actually emailed me first, asking for advice. I sent her to Blossom Books, and before I knew it, we had a series. Since we wanted the books to look like they belonged together but could also stand on their own, Myrthe asked me to design the covers. For Francien’s, I deliberately picked a different color and typeface. Those different colors later became a signature element of the series.

So now there’s going to be a v2 of my book. “I don’t know if I still want my face on the cover,” I told Myrthe. I’d been staring at my pink hair and oversized glasses for six years, and that photo wasn’t even from 2019—it was taken by Charlotte and me in 2016! That’s almost ten years ago now, and it just isn’t me anymore. Or well. It kind of is, but also… not.

Even more important are the changes inside the book. Back in 2018, I wrote the chapter about autism and gender/sexuality, in which I mostly let others do the talking. I cited statistics showing that autistic people are less likely to identify with their birth sex, and I mentioned that I didn’t really feel like I fit into the “woman” box myself, but that I didn’t have any big issues with it—and that was that. After the book came out, I met lots of readers. I heard and read their stories, and gradually a nagging feeling crept in: what if we, as a community, are seeing this in an incomplete way? What if we’ve settled on one explanation and stopped leaving room for other perspectives? And what if my book is contributing to that, by only presenting a single angle? My own view on gender (or rather, on sex) had shifted somewhat in the meantime. I wrote about that in this blog. A text along the same lines has now been added to the new edition of Maar je ziet er helemaal niet autistisch uit.

A few other things changed too: Riemer is no longer my partner, but my ex. Obviously, I’m not going to rewrite history, but in some places, past tense just fits better now. (Should I now also change Deze autist ging naar Japan… No Toeps, stop, don’t go there!) I added a new section about support levels in autism diagnoses, swapped out a few instances of “neurotypical” for “non-autistic” (when I wrote the book, terms like “neurodiverse” and “neurotypical” were still mostly used in the context of autism, but they’ve since broadened), and changed a few names.

This version will only come out once the current print run sells out—probably in a few months. In the meantime, I’m still nitpicking the new cover, which is being designed by a creative agency. Letting go of control is… a struggle, haha!

Now for the sales. I really can’t complain—while many authors would’ve ended up in the bargain bin by now, my book is still selling nicely six years later. Still, there’s a bit of a decline, something I can especially see on Amazon, where the sales data is so detailed I can track what sold per day and per country. Now, Amazon isn’t the only platform I sell through (though it’s the biggest), and I do see trends like the rise of audiobook listeners and people boycotting Amazon and buying through other distributors instead. But the conclusion remains the same: I’m selling just a little less each month.

And that makes sense, right? At some point, everyone who wants the book has it. Sure, new autism diagnoses happen every day, but over these six years a lot of other books have come out, I’m in every library, I’m available secondhand, etc. And yet, it still stings sometimes. A little voice in the back of my head says, “You should do more promotion!” Only to be immediately countered by another voice going, “Yeah, and then people will start complaining that it’s her again!” I know I shouldn’t let that stop me. But still, it’s tough.

These days, social media is full of autism influencers. They post daily facts or hot takes—preferably angry ones. They make videos about every time they stub their toe and how that relates to autism (lack of proprioception—see, I can do it too!) and how the world is a harsh place that just doesn’t understand us. And sure, there’s truth to that. I talk about these things in my book too. But running a full-blown autism account…

I just can’t do that. I’m not that. Even though it probably would have made me filthy rich if I had. And without sounding too much like the Karen types in “things we don’t want to hear anymore, number 7”: I’m not just my autism, I’m more than that. That doesn’t mean autism doesn’t shape my life—it absolutely does. I’m autistic, and you can see it and feel it and sense it in everything I do. But sometimes I want to post about trains, bridges, and dams. About curtains, vintage clothes, and IKEA furniture. About our cats, our life in Japan, and the endless paperwork involved. Probably all very autistic too, but it doesn’t sell books. Or well. Maybe it does. Indirectly.

Right now, I’m working on a planner together with Cynthia from Structuurjunkie. A special planner for anyone who wants to get better at managing sensory overload, complete with a planning method, instructional videos, the whole package. I’m really excited about it. From the moment the first layout PDFs came in from the designer, I’ve been printing new pages every week to plan out my schedule. At first it was just to test our product, but by now I honestly can’t live without it. The planner will be released this fall, and you can pre-order it here at Blossom Books.

For a while, we had a plan for another book. A sort of “live your best life” guide for autistic people, where I’d help readers shape their lives in a way that works for them. But soon enough, doubt started creeping in. Who am I to tell people how to live, when I regularly end up crying in bed, complaining to François that I want something different—but have no idea what that something is. I still feel a bit directionless sometimes. “I build websites, take photos, write books…” That’s the line I rattle off on autopilot whenever someone asks me what I do. The books? Yes, huge success. Amazing. Very happy with them. But secretly, it feels like the wave I was riding is slowly reaching the shore.

These days, I dream of totally different things. Like renovating an old house and renting it out, maybe. Can you picture it? A cute Japanese home with tatami floors, furnished with vintage finds from the thrift store? A place for people who want to stay in Japan for a while? Not an Airbnb, more like Sakura House, where people rent for at least a month. Just like I used to. During the photo shoots I do now, I love sharing my love for Japan. Honestly, I enjoy that even more than the photography itself. But yeah, you don’t just go out and buy a house, and renovating one isn’t exactly a simple project either. I have no idea how I’d actually make this happen, but hey. Putting things out into the nonexistent universe can’t hurt, right?

So now I’m left with a few questions: What should I focus on? Should I change the title of This autistic girl went to Japan? Should I update the English version of But you don’t look autistic at all the same way I’m updating the Dutch one? Should I even write another book at all? Should I buy and renovate an akiya? I’d love to hear your thoughts, so drop them in the comments!