Not Just The Spoken Word

(CBS)  Marlee Matlin is an actress best known for expressing deep emotions without uttering a word.

She won an Academy Award and a Golden Globe Award in 1986 for "Children of a Lesser God" as a proud, angry deaf woman who refuses to learn to speak. This season, she will once again join the cast of the NBC television series "The West Wing."

But recently, she tells The Early Show, she turned her attention from the screen to the page, as the author of a new book for young readers entitled, "Deaf Child Crossing."

In her writing debut, Matlin takes on a topic she knows well — growing up deaf. Matlin has been deaf since she was 18 months old.

The characters in "Deaf Child" are 9-year-old Megan and Cindy. The two form an unlikely friendship. Megan is boisterous, passionate and deaf. Cindy is shy, shrinks from attention and can hear.

However, their bond is tested at summer camp, and Megan learns to step out from the shadow of her "best friend forever."

To read an excerpt from Chapter One, click here.