The Trans Rights Readathon is an annual event from March 21-31, ending on Trans Day of Visibility. It is both a call to action to read and support trans books as well as a decentralized fundraiser for trans organizations.
At FORGE, we were inspired to talk about what books by and about trans folks have meant in our lives and communities. Share your thoughts with us on our Instagram or BlueSky accounts.
Note: Emil compiled all of our responses and took the liberty of interjecting their thoughts in a few places. Also, books and authors are generally only linked to on their first reference.
The questions:
- What are your earliest memories of books with trans/nonbinary characters or by trans authors?
- What books by or about trans people have been meaningful to you?
- What changes have you seen in trans books across your lifetime? What trends do you like or dislike?
- How have you seen books support healing in trans communities?
- What’s on your reading list? What are you looking forward to?
What are your earliest memories of books with trans/nonbinary characters or by trans authors?
Caleb
I think the first books I read about transness didn’t explicitly mention transness at all! I was fascinated by the Animorphs series by K.A. Applegate (who happens to have a trans child), about a group of kids who have the power to shapeshift into any animal they’ve touched. I loved this idea, both of being able to change your physical form at will, but that it’s also a complicated process, that sometimes it’s hard to adjust to an animal’s senses or the way they move in the world, or suddenly you’re very small and have to try not to get crushed, or maybe you stay in one form too long and can’t turn back into a human. Before I had words for being trans, that kind of transformation was what I wished was possible.
Emil
OMG Caleb, yes! I love the Animorphs so much! 100% agree on everything you said!!!!!!!!! And honestly, the only people I know who really remember these books are trans, so I think you’re on to something.
I remember quite a few kids’ fantasy books where a child is magically turned into a boy to hide the child from a witch or a curse. Then at some point the boy turns into a princess. Almost none of them are by trans folks or meant to be about trans people, but young Emil certainly took note of how chill these books were about gender being changeable. But I was in my late teens by the time I first read a book that was actually about trans people.
Kate Bornstein and Leslie Feinberg were the first trans authors I encountered (that I remember/knew of). Like so many people of my age/generation, Stone Butch Blues was a major book in my early adult years (PS – you can download a free pdf of the book at that link, if you haven’t read it!). Around that same time, I was spending more time with anarchists and punks and people who make zines – so I learned a lot that way. We passed around trans-inclusive sex education zines, queer critiques of capitalism, and a poster by Crimethinc that was against the gender binary.
michael
When I was in high school, I had the privilege of being in honors English classes, which allowed a wide(r) range of book options than most other English courses that had a pre-determined set of texts that would be covered each year. Students had the opportunity to suggest books we wanted to read, as well as had a probably-gay-male teacher who proposed books that had characters or authors who weren’t straight or cisgender. There were two books that stood out to me – but have since been critiqued and analyzed, and many trans activists have tussled about if the characters were trans, or not. Radclyffe Hall’s, The Well of Loneliness (1928) and Virgina Woolf’s Orlando (1928) both captivated me. I was filled with a sense of wonder, feeling like both books were somehow “progressive” for being published in the 1920s. I couldn’t fully understand why I found them to be radical when I was in high school. Some, today, would argue that their characters weren’t trans. Some would contend that they were.
I remember two other authors – George Eliot and George Sand – but have no memory about what BOOKS we actually read. In class, we explored why authors who were assigned female at birth would write under male names and “personas.” At that time, how we talked about their gender history and identities as authors was vastly different than conversations many would have today.
<Emil interjects: Wow! We did NOT have those conversations in high school. I’m not sure we read books by women in high school…>
With these books and authors, I’ve been aware of emerging theories, projections, and gendered determinations that people have made about them. The retroactive classification about author and character identities made me wonder in high school (and throughout my life) about the harms and benefits about people assigning genders, meanings, and trajectories to people who are no longer living. It has made me wonder, “how will people write/rewrite my history after I die?”
Loree
There may have been trans or nonbinary characters in the science fiction/fantasy I read, but the first trans book I remember is Jan Morris’s Conundrum, published the year before I graduated high school. The next one, unfortunately, was Janice Raymond’s The Transsexual Empire. This is the book that taught lesbian feminists to shun and denigrate transsexuals (particularly trans women). Some of us never learned better.
What books by or about trans people have been meaningful to you?
Caleb
I picked up a book based on Loree’s review: Female Husbands by Jen Manion. Reading about people who lived at various points in history who might have experienced their gender in a similar way that I have (although they didn’t call themselves trans) was really meaningful to me. This idea that being trans is a new thing is really damaging, in that it separates us from real histories of survival. I felt like I was reading something sacred, connecting with each of the people whose stories Manion told.
This took me down a rabbit hole of reading about trans history. I read The First Man-Made Man about Michael Dillon and his relationship with Roberta Cowell. I’ve also been reading We Both Laughed in Pleasure, The Selected Diaries of Lou Sullivan. This was another one of those “connections across time” that has given me a lot of appreciation for the vulnerability of writing about intimacy and connection through a trans lens.
I also can’t not mention Ursula K. Le Guin’s The Left Hand of Darkness. It’s a sci-fi novel about an alien race that does not have a concept of gender at all, and who change sex throughout their lives. I don’t think this book is necessarily about transness, but it opens up a lot of what if’s about a world in which gender isn’t so essential to our humanity, and changing in radical ways is the norm and not the exception.
Emil
Stone Butch Blues was major – in part for being one of the first really good fiction books about trans folks (in my life), and in part because of the politics of the book. Not only do we see the main character learn and grow around their gender and sexuality, but we also see them get involved in decades of political movements, from a working-class perspective. The main character gets to mess up and change their mind throughout the book.
Janet Mock’s memoirs also stand out to me – Redefining Realness and Surpassing Certainty. She challenged traditional trans narratives, especially in her second book. These were refreshing changes from memoirs that felt like they had to explain or justify trans existence.
I’ve also really found the work of Akwaeke Emezi to be incredible. When I first read Freshwater, I hadn’t read anything like it. Since then, I’ve read and would recommend everything they’ve written.
michael
I came out as queer in the 1980s and trans* in the 1990s. The 1990s were a time when so many trans books started to emerge. As our trans community was becoming more visible and mobilizing more AS a community, there were some seminal works that were published during the in the 1990s.
Most of what I read in the 1990s were nonfiction, anthologies, and biographies. Here are a few that were important to me (date order):
- Sandy Stone – The Empire Strikes Back: A Posttranssexual Manifesto (1987)
- aaron devor – Gender Blending: Confronting the Limits of Duality (1989)
- Leslie Feinberg – Stone Butch Blues (1993)
- Martine Rothblatt – Apartheid of Sex: A Manifesto on the Freedom of Gender (1995)
- Kate Bornstein – Gender Outlaw: On men, women and the rest of us (1995)
- aaron devor & Jamison Green – FTM: Female-to-Male Transsexuals in Society (1997)
- Carol Queen and Lawrence Schimel – PoMoSexuals: Challenging Assumptions About Gender and Sexuality – (1997)
- Kate Bornstein – My Gender Workbook: How to Become a Real Man, a Real Woman, the Real You, or Something Else Entirely (1997)
- Dylan Scholinski – The Last Time I Wore a Dress (1997)
A couple of comments on 2 of these books.
1
Feinberg’s Stone Buch Blues was often THE book that transformed and affirmed so many trans-masculine folks. It was a Bible for many. One that people read over and over – and a book that was often included in gender studies courses, or given to friends of family members to help them better understand trans lives.
Ironically, when I first read this book right after it came out, I couldn’t relate to it at all. I wasn’t butch. I could understand folks who were. I was attracted to butches and masculinity, but I didn’t see myself IN this book – like so many of my peers did.
Discourse around Feinberg’s identity was one of the first set of in-community confrontations and challenges. In later years, I saw much more of this kind of determining-someone’s-gender-for-them conversations, but for me, Leslie’s identity was the first. There were folks who wanted to claim Feinberg as a butch, as a lesbian, and firmly insist on she/her pronouns. While others determined that Feinberg was trans and we should all be using he/him pronouns and references. What an interesting paradox that gender was something community members so strongly asserted we each could define for ourselves – and yet, also felt the need to proscribe what someone else’s gender was.
Interesting factoid: The Lambda Literary Awards placed Feinberg’s book in the Lesbian Fiction category. At the time, there wasn’t a specific category for trans books. But even now, when there is an option for books to be categorized as trans books – how does that help or harm the expansiveness of books, stories, lived realities that span across many identities?
2
Wow, Carol Queen and Lawrence Schimel’s book PoMoSexuals: Challenging Assumptions About Gender and Sexuality was the first book that sparked something within me that I couldn’t identify at the time – but propelled me to explore other books and topics that explored more complex, nuanced conversations about identity. At the time, I don’t think I had the abilities to fully process the semi-academic lens of this book, but it led me to many other books, including Sandy Stone’s The Empire Strikes Back: A Posttranssexual Manifesto and Martine Rothblatt’s Apartheid of Sex: A Manifesto on the Freedom of Gender.
Bonus! I also loved the photography books that emerged in the 1990s-early 2000s, including:
Loren Cameron – Body Alchemy: Transsexual Portraits (1996)
Marriete Pathy Allen – The Gender Frontier (2003)
Del LaGrace Volcano / Jack Halberstam – The Drag King Book (1999)
Loree
I started my trans journey as the partner of a trans man, so the books that most spoke to me early on put trans people into context. Mary Boenke’s Trans Forming Families: Real Stories About Transgendered Loved Ones was groundbreaking for many of us. My all-time favorite remains Jackie Kay’s Trumpet. This novel was controversial to some because it did not put the focus on the trans person, who had just died when the book opens. The reader pieces together the story of his life through his surviving wife and grown child (who had never known his father was trans), along with the various officials who get involved when there is a death. This book explores the implications of being out and being stealth. It also shows how profoundly having a trans loved one can affect the people around them.
What changes have you seen in trans books across your lifetime? What trends do you like or dislike?
Caleb
I think there are a lot more books with trans characters intended for young audiences now. That’s really exciting to me. Trans books have existed for a long time, but they weren’t a part of my reading when I was a kid. As a teenager, some of the trans-related fiction I read was pretty dark and disheartening. It still connected with me (I love horror and darker stories), but I’m also glad that there are more options for kids and teens now. There should be room for stories about trauma and hardship, and there should be room for joy and fun and stories with trans characters that have nothing to do with their transness.
I’m also seeing a lot more indie and self-published fiction by trans authors, leveraging platforms like itch.io to get paid for their work without going through traditional publishing houses. It’s great that there have been efforts to uplift trans voices in traditional publishing, but it’s still incredibly daunting to step into if you haven’t seen others achieve that before, or don’t have an MFA or something like that. Whenever I can, I’m trying to support those indie projects.
Emil
Oh gosh, everything changes and everything stays the same. There are way more options now than there were ten, twenty, or thirty years ago. I can find multiple books with trans people in them for any age group. And there’s room for so much more! I want more picture books with trans people that aren’t “it’s okay to be different” books. I want literary fiction and adult sci-fi fantasy to catch up to the diversity we are seeing increase in young adult novels. I want more neo-pronouns.
Graphic novels are increasingly available, which I love! I find the ways that graphic novels can show emotions to often be more powerful than written feelings. I also love seeing the ways that artists draw trans, nonbinary, fat, and/or disabled bodies with so much love and tenderness. It’s incredibly moving to have access to that.
After reading michael’s answers on the last question, I want to add some thoughts on author’s identities. Questions about how authors identify and what communities they are a part of continue to be really big conversations in book spaces. There’s been a lot of harm done by people writing about communities they aren’t a part of, especially in very stereotypical ways. Often these authors are more privileged and make a ton of money, while authors from marginalized communities struggle to get published. I totally get why people want to know who an author is. At the same time, I’ve seen authors be outed or pressured to out themselves, and that’s not cool. There’s something in all this about how we take big collective/systemic problems and then put the burden on an individual to solve them.
There’s some great work in movements like #OwnVoices – which amplify people telling stories about communities they are a part of – are part of efforts to diversify publishing on a big scale. We need massive change in the publishing industry. These efforts aren’t meant to make authors share parts of themselves they aren’t ready to share. Also if we had way more trans authors and trans stories, maybe it wouldn’t matter quite so much to us what any one particular author was doing, because we’d have so many to choose from and people wouldn’t get away with so much exploitation.
michael
Within my lifetime, up until the mid-90s it was possible to own *every* book on trans issues. Now, it would be almost impossible to keep up with the abundance of new books published every day! What a welcome change in how possible it is to speak our truths, to be visible, to be in the mainstream, and to have complex, beautiful representations housed within the words of so many talented, creative artists.
It can sometimes be hard to see changes over time. One thing that fascinated me was to notice the evolution (as well as the addition of characters) in Alson Bechdel’s comic strip, Dykes To Watch Out For. The embrace of butchness throughout, the introduction of a main trans woman character, and also the emergence of a trans-masculine role was so exciting and reflective of the lesbian/queer community during the time of its writing (1983-2008). I remember some intentionality (either mentioned by Bechdel or by others analyzing) that the reason Bechdel didn’t include more trans masculine or trans men in the cartoons was because of the political structure at the time of trans men/masculine folks being excluded from lesbian spaces). Since the cartoon was mostly geared towards lesbian audiences, the characters represented more folks within that community. Things shifted over time, as our world shifted. Bechdel, imo, was groundbreaking in slowing including more trans content over the years. They also portrayed so many folks who identified as butch – which for so many of us, had strong overlap with trans identities.
Many of the books that touched me, that made me cry, that helped me feel connected and less alone — those books that I read in the late 1980s to mid-1990s — are now books that many people deem ‘politically incorrect.’
At the time, the books were progressive, groundbreaking. They said things in the language we had at the time. They put to words concepts that no one had dared to put on paper before.
These books that made me feel alive and excited about life, were also the books that many academics and community members determined were skewed in their use of language, or were somehow harmful to trans communities. Many times, those who critiqued these works were unable to remember when they were written, how they captured the time and essence of the community at that point in history. Many who offered criticism wrote off the authors of some of those books and never returned to those writers to see how they evolved and changed over time.
There is great dissonance for me between the language, content, themes, connections, stories shared in so many of the books I read early on with the current community-driven shift in language that both has a wide range of new words/concepts/expressions and also has dictated that some language to be pushed out of use. For those of us who have lived through several decades within the trans community, many of us frequently feel pushed aside with the language that some newer authors, activists, and community members are using (or “requiring”).
What helped mold my identity, what transformed me, and encouraged me to believe in possibilities (and have possibility models!), sometimes feels under ridden by in-community politics and policing. Much of the language and concepts from those early years are still resonant with me, and are words that I still associate with my identity, my essence, my core, my spirit. On some days, it feels like a fight to maintain who I am because of the erasure I feel. On other days, easily remember the core fullness of who I am, making sure I connect with others who “get me” and who embrace all my identities, histories, and experiences.
Loree
My lifetime has encompassed the mainstream emergence of three social movements: the women’s movement, the gay/LGBT movement, and the trans movement. For each, there was a period within which I thought I had “all” or at least most of the seminal books. That didn’t last long, obviously, with each subject rapidly outgrowing my shelving. My early trans books were the classics: Leslie Feinbert’s Stone Butch Blues, Kate Bornstein’s Gender Outlaw: On Men, Women, and the Rest of Us, Susan Stryker’s Transgender History, H. Devor’s Female-to-Male Transsexuals in Society, D. Scholinski’s The Last Time I Wore a Dress, Pat Califias’s Sex Changes: The Politics of Transgenderism. After that, more memoirs came: Jamison Green’s, Janet Mock’s, Sarah McBride’s, and Jennifer Finney Boylan’s. Now with the flowering of trans studies, books are emerging that seem beyond my literacy level, such as C. Riley Snorton’s Black on Both Sides: A Racial History of Trans Identity. (Sorry, C. Riley!)
How have you seen books support healing in trans communities?
Caleb
One of the ways I’ve seen this was when I attended a reading by Schuyler Bailar, about his book He/She/They. I’ve always found most of my trans community connections online, but to be in a physical space together is powerful. People shared personal stories, and Schuyler connected with folks individually. When one person has a platform to share their story, it opens up possibilities for others to be seen and heard, which feels central to healing for me.
<Emil: Check out Caleb’s blog post that talks more about that event!>
We’re living in a time of increasing censorship and attempts to silence trans voices. And despite those efforts, trans people are still writing and storytelling. Books can be banned, but I don’t think trans people are ever going to shut up, which is pretty beautiful.
Emil
I’m laughing at myself for coming up with these questions, because my answers are just: READ ALL THE BOOKS!!!!! Though honestly, read or don’t read however many books you like. All book reading styles are valid. That said, books have been a huge part of my life and the ways that I take care of myself and my friends.
Reading together: Sharing books with others is healing. I’ve read books because a friend related to them and I wanted to learn more about that person. I’ve shared books because I wanted to talk about the content with people I trust, to decide what I liked and didn’t like. My best friends and I read books out loud to each other – and once took an entire camping trip dedicated to a specific book. Books help me build community and spend time with people.
Imagining: I recently read Everything for Everyone. This book uses oral history to tell the story of how communes came to be (in the future. It’s fiction). It’s both hilarious – the academic intro is on point – and brilliant. Terraformers by Annalee Newitz is another example of a possible future that’s really nerdy and well done.
I love when stories can help us see how we can get to the future. Walidah Imarisha said, “All organizing is science fiction.” When we organize or work for social justice we are striving for something that doesn’t exist yet. In stories we get to live out alternative worlds and societies, which is really powerful.
I also get so much from reading stories about people who are not like me. I don’t need to see myself in a story to realize that all people are important and deserve dignity and respect. Books have opened so many worlds to me, for which I am forever grateful.
Practical tools: Books are filled with ideas and tips. I can’t count the number of fiction books I’ve read that provide advice for panic attacks. Books can introduce us to ideas and concepts, explain therapy speak, and teach us all sorts of things. They’ve helped me understand my brain and my friends’ brains. Books have taught me cooking skills and helped me unpack internalized oppressive beliefs.
Libraries: Libraries are such an incredible example of what society can do. Free books, free internet, free places to sit around, run by a group of people that will defend the right to learn, to create, to be yourself, and to exist. Along with there being more trans books (and again, we still need way more than we have), there are libraries and librarians who are creating displays and curating collections so that all people have access to these books. Every pride display, every trans people belong display in a library brings me such joy, and I think that’s a big part of healing.
The Queer Liberation Library is a really cool project. It’s an entirely virtual library, that anyone can register for. It uses the Libby app (library app for audio and e-books). The idea is that not everyone has access to a library with a wide queer and trans selection, and not everyone can safely check books out from a local library. They’ve got a huge selection of LGBTQ+ books.
I find healing and wellbeing in all the ways that people find to build community, take care of each other, and do that while investing in their passions. A bunch of people who love books made QLL. People can take action in all sorts of ways to take care of each other.
michael
I have loved seeing the collaboration between authors, especially between trans and non-trans folks – and especially in works of fiction where transness isn’t necessarily a central focus. For me, I find it healing to be a witness to the connection across what used to be some rigid lines of identity.
A semi-recent example of trans/non-trans collaboration is the really beautifully written and complex story that unravels in Jennifer Finney Boylan and Jodi Picoult’s book Mad Honey (2022). If you haven’t read it – it is a smooth read, with a captivating story, and complex characters.
Books that more overtly address healing, particularly around sexual and other forms of harm, include these favorites:
- Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha with Ejeris Dixon – Beyond Survival: Strategies and Stories from the Transformative Justice Movement (2020)
- Kate Bornstein – Hello Cruel World: 101 Alternatives to Suicide for Teens, Freaks, and Other Outlaws (2006)
- Lexie Bean et al – Written on the Body: Letters from Trans and Nonbinary Survivors of Sexual Assault (2018)
- Eli Clare – exile and pride: disability, queerness, and liberation (1999)
- Prentis Hemphill – What it Takes to Heal: How Transforming Ourselves Can Change the World (2024)
The mere fact that there are so, so, so many books now means that there is beauty, healing, critical thinking, resonance, harmonic-ness, affirmation, many, many, many voices and opinions. All of those things are healing.
Loree
To me, one of the most important roles trans books can play is as mirrors, allowing readers to see themselves, their identities, and their experiences reflected. Many of us still exist in communities largely devoid of other trans people, and books have been a critical way of filling that absence. I have also found healing in science fiction/fantasy books in which being trans is simply normal and unremarkable. In times like now when trans people are so vilified, I need reminders that a loving, accepting world is possible.
What’s on your reading list? What are you looking forward to?
Caleb
I’ve been really excited about new trans horror coming out. It seems like there’s been an increase of anthologies at this specific intersection of transness and (often body-focused) horror! I also have a short attention span these days, so finding lots of short trans fiction in one place is amazing. I can’t wait to read:
- Your Body is Not Your Body – an anthology of weird body horror by tenebrous press,
- Meat4Meat – a trans body horror anthology that isn’t out yet! I’ve signed up to support the project so I can read it as soon as it comes out, and
- I just learned about We Can Always Tell: An Anthology of Trans Erotic Horror, coming soon from Laughing Man House Publishing.
Emil
TBH I have 1385 books (I did the math on 3/5/25 – so it’s probably bigger by the time you read this) on my To Be Read list, and new books come out every week. I’m excited about this list of Black transfemme authors with books about to come out. I’ve already set up my Libby app to notify me when they come out.
Already checked out, I have: Trans Femme Futures and Trans/Rad/Fem that I’m excited about!
michael
Three books are on my excited to read list:
- Dean Spade – Love in a f*cked-up world: how to build relationships, hook up, and raise hell together (2025)
- Carolyn Wolf-Gould, Dallas Denny, Jamison Green – a history of transgender medicine in the united states: from margins to mainstream (2025)
- Susan Stryker – when monsters speak (2025)
<Emil: Looking forward to talking to you about Love in F*cked Up World!>
Loree
I’m looking forward to reading Nico Lang’s new book, American Teenager: How Trans Kids are Surviving Hate and Finding Joy in a Turbulent Era. I’ve been following Lang’s trans panic reporting for a couple years now, and look forward to the conclusions he’s drawn about our youth.
<Emil: I loved this book!!!>
