The Best Books We Read in 2018: Queer History & Bios
| 12/30/18
Leonardo da Vinci
Leonardo da Vinci by Walter Isaacson is the exciting new biography of the Renaissance's greatest mind and artist. Paramount Pictures has bought the film rights to Isaacson's work, and will turn it into a major motion picture starring Leonardo DiCaprio. Based on the voluminous notebooks and diaries as well as new discoveries about his work and life, Isaacson weaves a narrative that intertwines this master's art and science. Da Vinci delighted in combining his many diverse passions to spur his creativity. His notebooks were fill with intricate designs and engineering blueprints, but he also painted true masterpieces like The Last Supper and the Mona Lisa. He peeled the flesh off cadavers to create detailed drawings of the human body, explored the mathematics of optics and light, and even staged theatrical productions. Leonardo reveled in his role of a misfit. Not only was he a gay man but also illegitimate, vegetarian, left-handed, and at times heretical for his beliefs and writings. Isaacson perfectly captures the depth and creativity of this genius in his lengthy yet accessible biography, filled with dozens of illustrations and appropriate footnotes. Leonardo da Vinci paints a vivid portrait of a man whose life still has relevance today, not just appreciating his works of art and engineering but also in his dynamic approach to life that embraced diversity of thought. (Simon And Schuster)
The Unpunished Vice: A Life Of Reading
The Unpunished Vice: A Life Of Reading is a new memoir penned by legendary gay author Edmund White. Following heart surgery in 2014, the literary icon temporarily lost his desire to read. Only at this point did he realize how reading had influenced his life. The author of books such as A Boy's Own Story and The Beautiful Room Is Empty understood how books had formed his tastes, shaped his memories, amused him, and framed his beliefs. He came to understand how each momentous occasion in his life came with an accompanying book. Marcel Proust's Remembrance Of Things Past mirrored White's own gay experiences at a boarding school in Michigan. A biography of Stephen Crane inspired one of his own novels. Poems by Ezra Pound merged with his memories of a lover he once followed to New York, much the way a single word or scent can instantly transport us to a vivid memory of a person or place or event in the past. Both memoir and literary criticism, The Unpunished Vice is a compendium of the way reading has shaped the writer's life and work. It is filled with colorful little snippets of life as well, such as reading Henry James to Peggy Guggenheim in a private gondola in Venice. White invites us into his private side to learn much as he did how he was shaped and formed by the books he read. (Bloomsbury)
Me And My House: James Baldwin’s Last Decade In France
Me And My House: James Baldwin's Last Decade In France by Magdalena J. Zaborowska explores the last 16 years of the famed author's life and how his sprawling house in a small village in southern France influenced his works. Dubbed "Chez" Baldwin, the home is used as a lens to frame the issues of blackness, queerness, and domesticity in Baldwin's life. Zabrowska effortlessly connects the themes of dwelling and black queer sexuality found in The Welcome Table, Just Above My Head, and If Beale Street Could Talk directly to the home's influence on the writer. Me And My House is heavily illustrated throughout inviting the reader to visualize the home as a means to more easily understand the connections between his home and his works. Relying on extensive interviews with Baldwin's friends and lovers, manuscripts, and unpublished letters, Zaborowska introduces new insights into the writer's life and work. Me And My House is an essential read for both serious students and scholars, but also fans wishing to know more about the life and motivations of this iconic master. (Duke University Press)
Ike’s Mystery Man: The Secret Lives Of Robert Cutler
Ike's Mystery Man: The Secret Lives Of Robert Cutler by Peter Shinkle shares the never-before-told story of one of the key figures in the Cold War. Holding the position of Special Assistant For National Security Affairs (now known as the National Security Advisor), Robert Cutler was the closest confidante of President Dwight Eisenhower. He was a camera-shy and mysterious man who was also a lawyer, writer, bank president, and stalwart Republican. To the American public, he was a bachelor devoted to his country and his work. What the country did not know was that Cutler was also gay. Based on his own six-volume, 725-page diaries, Ike's Mystery Man pulls back the curtain to reveal the great depth of the man, his open private life, and how valuable he was to Eisenhower in the struggle against communism. Cutler was there to help develop policy regarding the nuclear arms race with the Soviet Union. He also reformed the National Security Council, helping it achieve its place of prominence today. Shinkle also reveals the love between Cutler and NSC staffer Skip Koons, and how their affair out of necessity was kept hidden to not harm the Eisenhower presidency. It is a scintillating tale that shows the personal sacrifices Cutler endured to serve his country, which viewed LGBTQ folks as criminal deviants and a threat to national security. (Steerforth Press)
The Rules Do Not Apply
The Rules Do Not Apply by Ariel Levy is a memoir from the New York Times best-selling author. In 2012, Levy's life was going smoothly. The 38-year-old writer was married, pregnant, financially secure, and highly successful on her own terms. As she departed for a reporting trip to Mongolia, her life seemed to be humming along happily. But then everything changed: She lost her child, ended the relationship with her partner Lucy, and no longer had a home. The Rules Do Not Apply is the story of how her life dramatically changed almost overnight, and how this led her to reevaluate her goals, her values, and the nature of her relationships with others. Levy's is a story of resistance to traditional norms and finding instead the ability to redefine her life on her own terms. The Rules Do Not Apply is both heartbreaking and inspirational, taking the reader on her journey into despair only to reemerge a stronger woman for her efforts. Levy is the author of Female Chauvinist Pigs and received the National Magazine Award for Essays and Criticism in 2014 for her piece "Thanksgiving In Mongolia." Her memoir is equally praiseworthy for both its content and relatable writing style. (Random House)
Apples & Oranges: My Journey Through Sexual Identity
Apples & Oranges: My Journey Through Sexual Identity by Jan Clausen is the personal memoir of the award-winning author and her crisis with identity and the limits of tolerance and community. The product of a 1950s middle-class upbringing that was long on conformity and lacking in sexual and gender-awareness, Clausen is liberated by the hippie movement of the following decade. She explores her sexuality as a failed topless dancer and through various heterosexual exploits before crossing over and meeting her first female lover. She eventually finds herself amid New York's burgeoning feminist community of the 1970s, and falls for the writer and activist Leslie Kaplow. The two women soon make a life together with their daughter in Brooklyn's strong and vibrant lesbian community of the 1980s. Throughout it all, though, Clausen felt constricted by those she saw as enforcing an ideological purity similar to what she knew growing up as a child. Then she falls in love with a West Indian man while working in Nicaragua, an unpardonable act to some that eventually drives her from the life and community she had known. Back in print 10 years after it was originally published, Apples & Oranges remains an unflinching and unsentimental examination of how desire can invigorate a life that has grown stale but at an enormous cost to both one's self and to those we love. (Seven Stories Press)
The Rest Of It: Hustlers, Cocaine, Depression, and Then Some 1976-1988
The Rest Of It: Hustlers, Cocaine, Depression, and Then Some 1976-1988 by famed author and gay historian Martin Duberman is a brutally honest memoir of his descent into despair and destruction that followed the passing of his mother. Duberman is known as one of the founders of LGBTQ studies in academia as well as his seminal works like Stonewall and Hidden From History: Reclaiming The Gay And Lesbian Past. His life was thrown into turmoil for over 10 years after the loss of his mother. The Rest Of It focuses exclusively on this one period of his life where he descended into the depths of drugs, despair, and depravity, only to reemerge a stronger man for the journey. Despite delving into the gay party and hustler scene of the era, Duberman was still able to be a leading voice in academia and write such classics as his biography of Paul Robeson. During this period, he helped create the discipline of Gay and Lesbian Studies. Filled with tidbits of gossip with appearances by luminaries of the era like Gore Vidal and Norman Mailer, The Rest Of Us is a brutally honest examination of a painful period in the writer's life and career. (Duke University Press)
Making Oscar Wilde
Making Oscar Wilde by Michele Mendelssohn is a new look at the Irish author and playwright who was truly a personality before his time. With works like The Importance Of Being Earnest and The Picture Of Dorian Gray, Wilde has earned his place of honor among English literature. His prose is as fiercely witty as it is bitingly honest, and his presence at parties and gatherings was sought by the aristocracy and elites on both sides of the Atlantic Ocean. It was this same arrogance and self-assurance that made him such a desired commodity that also led to his rapid and complete downfall and ostracization. A sexually liberated man in a time of conformity and intolerance, he was almost destined for downfall. Only after his untimely death and the passage of time was he given a renewed legitimacy in the literary circles. Making Oscar Wilde is a new look at the man and his times, of his rise from Irish eccentric to a global icon to his rapid fall from grace. Both tragic and touching, Mendelssohn has penned a biography worthy of its subject. She takes the reader behind the scenes of Victorian England and post-Civil War America to reveal a secret self-creation that would make modern internet influencers turn green with envy. (Oxford University Press)
Watching Skies: Star Wars, Spielberg And Us
Watching Skies: Star Wars, Spielberg And Us by Mark O'Connell is the story of one boy's obsession in the 1980s for the toys and paraphernalia of the American movie industry. Before he was a Star Wars fan, young Mark O'Connell was a James Bond aficionado, which made perfect sense since his grandfather was the chauffeur to Bond producer Alfred Broccoli. But he soon found himself in the throws of the George Lucas and Steven Spielberg revolution in cinema in large part because of the mega-merchandising that accompanied their films. His room was an evolving homage to their latest offerings, with a toybox filled with x-wing fighters and life-like action figures. O'Connell dreamed not of being Luke Walker battling Darth Vader and Imperial Stormtroopers, but instead he wanted to be an actor in the Star Wars toy commercials. Watching Skies follows the author's obsession from start to finish, revealing the trauma of losing his entire action figure collection to honeymooning on the Amity Island of Jaws fame. It is a personal memoir which takes the reader back to a time when movies were breaking new territory in storylines and cinematic effects, with merchandising that took the movies off the screens and into our bedrooms. (The History Press)
There Will Be No Miracles Here
There Will Be No Miracles Here by Casey Gerald is part memoir and part manifesto from this electrifying young man from the wrong side of the tracks. Born in Dallas to an unstable home, Gerald had everything pointed against him. His fragile mother disappears frequently without warning while he and his sister live on the margins of society, with little certainty in the lives except hunger, poverty, and oppression. His father was a football legend who played for the famed Woody Hayes at Ohio State, so he seized the opportunity to follow in his gridiron footsteps at Yale University. Gerald finds himself thrust into an alien world, a gay man of color out of his element, a fish out of water. And yet, he excels in the classroom just as he does as a star cornerback on the field. He graduates and then obtains his MBA from Harvard, but finds himself dissatisfied with big law firms and lifeless corporate offices. Gerald's is a true rags-to-riches story on its surface, yet he rejects that interpretation. Instead he sees himself as a witness to a world where the elite use stories like his precisely to keep others from rising on a similar trajectory. Worse still, he comes to the realization how his own ascension enables and perpetuates this scheme of institutional oppression. There Will Be No Miracles Here is Gerald's declaration that there can be more to life than wealth, power, and recognition. It is both a chronicle of his rise as well as his observations of community, humanity, tolerance, oppression, and sexuality. (Riverhead Books)
Jimmy Neurosis: A Memoir
Jimmy Neurosis: A Memoir by James Oseland is the celebrated figure of the food world's tale of being young, gay, and punk in 1970s America. Long before he became a famous judge on Top Chef Masters, Oseland was a teenage rebel growing up in the pre-Silicon Valley days of the Bay Area. Seeking something more than was offered in his suburban environment, he assumed the moniker and persona of Jimmy Neurosis and dove headfirst into the vibrant underground of the burgeoning punk rock movement. His journey led him from the mosh pits of San Francisco to the Manhattan world of Andy Warhol and his retinue of followers. His wild ways showed him a different side of society than the one in which he was raised, with drug-fueled parties and sexual excess. Oseland found friends across the spectrum of nationalities and personalities, but also learned the consequence of rash and irresponsible decisions. Jimmy Neurosis is a funny yet full-force rocket ride into the cocktail of art, music, drugs and sex that came to represent the anti-establishment nature of the late seventies. Oseland tells a unique American Punk coming-of-age story that shows how his creative impulses helped save his life and put him on the road to self-awareness and self-acceptance. (Harper Collins)
The Name Dropper
The Name Dropper by Tim Tyrrell is the retelling of the gay actor and broadcaster's 40 years in film, radio, and television. He began his career at eight years old when he appeared as an extra in the television movie To Kill A Cop, and he went on to appear in dozens of roles in film and television. As a teenager he took an interest in becoming a disc jockey and was soon playing clubs where he was not old enough to be a patron. Before he turned 20, he was working at New York radio station Soft Rock 105 WNSR. Since then he has made a name for himself in a variety of roles throughout the entertainment world. The Name Dropper lives up to its name as Tyrrell does just that. He provides plenty of stories and anecdotes of celebrities he met throughout his career. Well-known names like Madonna, Jennifer Lopez, Celine Deon, Robert Redford, and George Michael populate its pages. Tyrrell also talks honestly about his 22-year marriage to British broadcaster Ray Daniels, who tragically passed away in 2015 at the age of 52. The Name Dropper is both light-hearted and deeply personal, a memoir that reveal much about both the author and the entertainment industry. (Independently published)
Would You Rather? A Memoir Of Growing Up and Coming Out
Would You Rather? A Memoir Of Growing Up and Coming Out by Katie Heaney is the BuzzFeed editor's discovery and acceptance of her own sexuality. When she published her first collection of essays about her life as a single young woman to the age of 25, she just assumed she'd one day meet the right man to sweep her off her feet. Three years later, though, she had met the right girl and learned she wasn't quite the person she originally assumed. Would You Rather? is Heaney's collection of essays detailing her journey of discovery from a straight girl to a lesbian woman learning to embrace her sexuality. She invites the reader to join her as she revisits the past to understand her future. Heaney tries to find a direct path from her heterosexual past to her lesbian self of the now, but finds that life doesn't always conveniently move from point A to point B. Along the way she provides snippets of her life such as the trials of dating in New York to her obsession over Harry Styles. Would You Rather explores love, sexuality, identity, and friendship through the lens of Heaney's endearing intimacy and neurotic wit. Above all else, her latest work makes the emphatic point that it's never too late to find love and yourself in the process. (Ballantine Books)
Iron City Journals: January – May 1965
Iron City Journals: January - May 1965 by Allen Ginsberg and edited by Michael Schumacher is the first volume in a forthcoming trilogy of the literary icon's unpublished journals. His writings here are a travel guide through the mind of the Beat Generation's best, which chart his poetry, political hijinks, and high-profile encounters behind the Iron Curtain during the height of the Cold War. They were written over a six-month period in 1965 after he is deported from Cuba to Prague. From there, he travels across the Soviet satellite states visiting Poland, the Warsaw Ghetto, and Auschwitz, as well as visiting Russia, the land of his heritage. Warned to keep a low profile upon his return to Prague, he is discovered by students who ceremoniously parade him through the streets in the back of a flatbed truck. He is discovered by the authorities, beaten, and deported to England just in time to help stage an international poetry reading at Royal Albert Hall. His journals capture a time and place where freedom of speech and expression were brutally suppressed by a totalitarian regime. They are filled with descriptions of the passing scenery as well as graphic recreations of his sexual encounters, where snippets of poetry are juxtaposed with political intrigues, scraps of conversations, random observations of daily events, and encounters with faceless bureaucrats. To be followed by South American Journals and The Fall Of America Journals, this work is a must-read for those looking to better understand Ginsberg and his times. (University of Minnesota Press)
LGBTQ Cleveland
LGBTQ CLEVELAND by Ken Schneck is the latest in Arcadia Publishing Images Of America series and it does not disappoint. Within its pages is the history of the LGBTQ movement in Cleveland with all its exuberance and excess, heroes and villains, and battles for acceptance. The book is lovingly illustrated with hundreds of illustrations that bring back all the events in vivid detail. On its pages one can revisit the earliest Gay Pride events, explore the bathhouse era with pictures and descriptions (did you know some offered free brunch buffets?), and see how the city and community responded to the AIDS crisis. It's all here in LGBTQ CLEVELAND. There are drag queens and demonstrations, are politicians and celebrities, rock 'n roll and community activism. Schneck doesn't shy away from the tough subjects either, such as a homophobic arsonist as well as the racism that sometimes reared its ugly head in some gay establishments. Freddie Mercury, Billie Jean King, and former Cleveland Mayor and presidential candidate Dennis Kucinich all make an appearance. With its vibrant pictures, concise text, and thick stock paper, LBGTQ CLEVELAND is the perfect book for the bookshelf or coffee table. (Arcadia Publishing)
Hard To Be A Saint In The City: The Spiritual Visions Of The Beat
Hard To Be A Saint In The City: The Spiritual Visions Of The Beat edited by Robert Inchausti is an examination of the spiritual beliefs and motivations of the Beat Movement. Rather than explain it to the reader, the writers' own words fill the pages through carefully selected excerpts on the subject. Inchausti shows how at its heart the Beat Movement was a spiritual enterprise that goes behind the Buddhism of many of the key writers of the period. Kerouac, Ginsberg, Burroughs, and others made it cool to be a thinking person seeking a deeper spiritual experience and how one could translate that into everyday life. Hard To Be A Saint In The City goes beyond the spirituality of the Beat Movement to explain the basic concepts of the writing process itself. Chapters start with a brief overview of the concept to be covered, then rush headlong into excerpts from the authors themselves on the topic. Readers will want to delve into topics such as "How Do The Beats Conceive Of The Divine?" and "Is The A Beat Way Of Writing?" Inchausti has compiled this treasury of excerpts from the luminary and the lesser figures of the generation in a way that explains the spiritual beliefs, motivations, and actualizations of the Beat Movement in their own words. (Shambhala Publications)
My Uncle Gloria
My Uncle Gloria by Steven Shulman is the story of how a family learns to understand and coexist with against the backdrop of their uncle's transition. Uncle Butch was the classic macho man. He was a womanizer. He was the owner and operator of an auto junkyard. And he was also a woman trapped in a man's body. When at age 66 he decided to transition. Shulman was a boy at the time of his uncle's decision, and he thought him a coward and a deviant as did much of his family. He hated his uncle for his decision and began to write about the transition, thinking that putting words to paper was the ultimate revenge. At first he was angry, but as he maturated physically over time so too did his feelings about his uncle. My Uncle Gloria tells the story of one neurotic and unhinged family's dysfunction, and how Butch's transition provided the opportunity to confront and accept their issues. In the end, Shulman writes from the heart about his own personal growth and discovery, how he learns the meaning of acceptance and the strength of family bonds. (Self-published)
On the Other Side of Freedom: The Case for Hope
On the Other Side of Freedom: The Case For Hope by DeRay Mckesson is the first book from the internationally famous activist, podcaster, and community organizer. When an 18-year-old African-American young man was shot and killed by a white police officer in Ferguson, Mo., Mckesson noticed the conflicting coverage of the event on television. Like millions across the country, he was incensed that yet another young black man was gunned down. He headed to Ferguson without a plan save to make his voice heard and make a difference in the process. He ended up staying for over a year on the front lines and became the leading voice in the Black Lives Matter movement. ON THE OTHER SIDE OF FREEDOM is indictment of a society that systematically oppresses people of color, and a call to others showing how they can bring about real change through their activism. Mckesson sheds a bright light on how institutional corruption, unchecked racism, inequality, and injustice enables the continued history of racism by insidiously hiding it within the fabric of society itself. He analyzes the failures forced upon the movement by ideological purist unwilling to take a stand and make a fight. ON THE OTHER SIDE OF FREEDOM is a clear-eyed yet lyrical work of both immediate relevance and enduring consequence. (Penguin Random House)
The Boy With The Perpetual Nervousness
The Boy With The Perpetual Nervousness by Graham Caveney is the heart-wrenching yet ultimately redemptive tale of one boy's struggle to escape the limitations and abuse of his small hometown and upbringing. Growing up gay in a small town in the north of 1970s England was difficult enough. Boys were expected to play football and become part of the respectable working class with a job in the local cotton mill. Caveney instead found himself on the outside looking in, drawn to the likes of Kafka and alternative music. The church played a major role in the community, and looms large in this book because underneath their veneer of respectability and altruism was a sordid secret for Caveney. He was molestated by the school headmaster and Catholic priest, and his life was turned upside-down as a result. He became a successful writer on the surface, but soon he was forced to deal with the issued that had their roots in his childhood. Beautifully written but unafraid of sharing some unsettling truths, The Boy With The Perpetual Nervousness the story of how one man came to terms with the unpleasant realities of his past, both those committed by others as well as his reactions to these acts. (Simon & Schuster)
Saving Alex: When I Was Fifteen I Told My Mormon Parents I Was Gay And That’s When My Nightmare Began
Saving Alex: When I Was Fifteen I Told My Mormon Parents I Was Gay And That's When My Nightmare Began by Alex Cooper and Joanna Brooks is the true story of a lesbian Mormon teen who was held captive and forced to undergo conversion therapy before escaping and making history. In 2009, Alex Cooper was a 15-year-old teen living in the high desert communities of Southern California with her devout Mormon family. She had dreams of going to university and becoming an important lawyer in far-off New York City. All around her she felt the pull of the faith of her family, but inside she knew she was different. When she finally told her family she was gay, though, she found just how deep their religious faith descended. She was escorted to an unlicensed residential treatment program in Utah where her parents were promised she would be saved from her homosexuality. And so began her eight months of hell, testing her faith in herself by tormenting her with a perverted version of their own faith. With the help of an out gay student at her new school, she is finally able to escape their imprisonment and become the first minor to gain official protection by the state of Utah for her sexuality. SAVING ALEX is the frightening but ultimately inspirational narrative of a girl in a broken world who escapes the bonds of religious and societal intolerance to realize her own voice and set a legal precedent of acceptance for LGBTQ youth. (HarperCollins)
Stray: Memoir Of A Runaway
Stray: Memoir Of A Runaway by Tanya Marquardt is the true story of how the author and performer was able to escape homelessness and her own mistakes. Unhappy with her dysfunctional and emotionally abusive home life, Marquardt calls a cab on her 16th birthday and runs away. She blames her mother for her parent's recent divorce and figures this is the best way she can strike back at her. But in reality, Marquardt is only sending her into a life on the edges, filled with drugs and desperation. She becomes one of the countless teenagers with no money and little hope of escape who are preyed upon by middle-aged men bringing gifts of cigarettes, cheap beer, and a temporary place to stay. Returning home months later makes matters only worse, as she faces renewed betrayal and emotional abandonment. Luckily for Marquardt, though, she has protectors and they help her recognize how her own compelling voice could become a path of fulfilment and escape. STRAY is the story of how one young woman was embrace her own vulnerabilities and heal the wounds of the past as she forges ahead into adulthood. (Little A)
Fascination: Memoirs
Fascination: Memoirs by Kevin Killian is the personal story of gay life in 1970s Long Island by the gay poet and novelist. The combination of an earlier memoir and unpublished prose, Memoirs effortlessly depicts the author's early struggles to become a writer in a period filled with drugs, sex, and excess. This is the era of the end of Richard Nixon and the beginning of David Bowie, where the traditional and the outlandish clashed to create a period of doubt and confusion about the institutions and norms that had previously guided society. Killian writes both lovingly and brutally about his experiences, from his brief affair with composer Arthur Russell to becoming a leading voice in experimental gay writing. Memoir is the story of one gay man's loneliness and desire in an age of previously unimagined liberation, and how he learned from these experiences to become one of the movement's greatest voices. (MIT Press)
50 Queers Who Changed the World: A Celebration of LGBTQ+ Icons
50 Queers Who Changed the World: A Celebration of LGBTQ+ Icons by Dan Jones is the tribute to the pioneering gay icons who made a difference in the struggle for tolerance and acceptance. Queer people have fought long and hard over many generations to express their identities to a traditionally hostile heteronormative world. From Oscar Wilde in Victorian England to Harvey Milk in 1970s San Francisco, such fearless trailblazers have fought the good fight and often paid the ultimate price. 50 QUEERS is a palm-sized primer that provides a quick profile and colorful illustration of not just the well-known gay icons but also perhaps the unfamiliar. While countless millions followed the physicist and educator Sally Ride as she became the first female astronaut, few knew that she was a lesbian until her passing in 2012. Jones digs deep to bring awareness to those who blazed the trail for the LGBTQ+ community. Names like Rock Hudson, Freddie Mercury, and RuPaul are mixed with others like Rachel Maddow, Alan Turing, and the glamorous and outrageous Divine. 50 QUEERS WHO CHANGED THE WORLD is a colorful tribute to some of the most inspirational figures in LGBTQ+ history. (Hardie Grant Books)
Trans Like Me: Conversations For All Of Us
Trans Like Me: Conversations For All Of Us by CN Lester is a deeply personal and culture-driven examination of the questions and issues facing the transgender community. In recent years transgender people have been much more visible in the news, film and television, politics and government, and "mainstream" society. Folks like Caitlyn Jenner, Lavern Cox, and Laverne Cox have all provide needed awareness to everyday people. Still with the struggle for acceptance and tolerance lingers from the ranks of the military to the bathrooms of the deep south. Trans Like Me tackles the harmful myths perpetuated by intolerant elements of the media, and political and religious leaders, as well as the outdated and narrow-minded beliefs of what constitutes gender. Non-binary Lester explores such topics as the history of trans celebrities, Lester's own personal journey, and even stories of trans exclusion from some within the feminist movement. Trans Like Me draws from scientific and historical studies, observation, and personal experience to discredit social prejudice and bigotry while also offering solace to the "other." With this work, Lester truly hopes to initiate conversations for all of us. (Seal Press)
UNBOUND: Transgender Men And The Remaking Of Identity
UNBOUND: Transgender Men And The Remaking Of Identity by Arlene Stein is an intimate examination of a new generation of transmasculine individuals as they undergo transition. This powerful and illuminating book is the result of years of interviews with hundreds of individuals across the country to help a wider audience understand how trans people conceive of their identities and sexuality, how they decided to transition, how they were received by families, friends and community, and the challenges and joys presented by their transition. Arlene Stein is a professor of sociology at Rutgers University as well as the director of the Institute for Research on Women, the author of six books, and the winner of the Ruth Benedict Prize for her book The Stranger Next Door. She introduces the reader to four patients of Dr. Charles Garramone as they prepare for surgery to masculinize their chests. Three of them are also taking testosterone so others can recognize them as male. Stein follows these four over the course of a year to show how a younger transgender generation, as well as other gender dissidents, are refashioning not just their identities but also challenging the misconceptions of society. (Pantheon Books)
MY BUTCH CAREER: A Memoir
My Butch Career: A Memoir by noted queer anthropologist, activist, and author Esther Newton is her disarming and compelling story of life during a period of particularly intense homophobic persecution in the 20th century. Newton writes of her own deeply personal experiences showing the difficulties she faced throughout life, from her molestation as a child to being denied tenure at Queens College despite having produced groundbreaking research and writings. As a child she became "a girl refusenik, caught between genders" who later sought to conform to straight life in high school and college. She describes the strong influence of her deeply masculine father, of her introduction to middle-class gay life, and of her varied love affairs. By the time her narrative ends at the age of forty, she finds herself an integral founding member of the first politicized generation of out lesbian and gay scholars, many of whom she helped create gender and sexuality studies. My Butch Career is the humorous and graceful story of a gender outlaw in the making, blazing the trail in queer academia. (Duke University Press)
