A random collection of over 2078 books and audiobooks authored by or about my transgender, intersex sisters, and gender-nonconforming persons all over the world. I read some of them, and I was inspired by some of them. I met some of the authors and heroines, some of them are my best friends, and I had the pleasure and honor of interviewing some of them. If you know of any transgender biography that I have not covered yet, please let me know.
Original title: "Moi, Giovanna: Une enfance trans à Bogota" (Me, Giovanna: A Trans Childhood in Bogota) by Giovanna Rincon and Stéphanie Malphettes.
Moi, Giovanna: Une enfance trans à Bogotá is not simply a memoir, it is an act of survival put into words, a narrative that refuses silence and respectability alike. Written by Giovanna Rincon with the close, attentive collaboration of Stéphanie Malphettes, the book unfolds as a coming-of-age story forged in violence, tenderness, fear and stubborn joy. From the first pages, the reader understands that this is not a story told from a safe distance. It is lived experience, recalled with clarity and urgency, shaped by memory and by the political necessity of telling the truth.
Giovanna is born in Bogotá in 1969, into a poor and unstable household. Her father is a cobbler, her mother a housewife, and money, affection and security are all scarce. From childhood, she knows she is a girl, even though she has been assigned a boy’s name and body. This certainty is not presented as confusion or questioning, but as something deeply rooted, quiet and unshakeable. The world around her, however, has no place for that truth. Her father is violent, deceitful, humiliating, and the home becomes a space of constant tension. Masculinity is imposed on her like a punishment, through gestures, postures and expectations she never chose. The book captures this suffocation with painful precision, showing how gender norms are enforced not only through words, but through daily cruelty.
2026,
Colombia,
French,
Giovanna Rincon,
Full title: "Sincerely, Katherine.: Life, Gender, Inclusivity, and Leadership for the Future" by Katherine Dudtschak.
There are books that entertain, and there are books that quietly shift the ground beneath your feet. Sincerely, Katherine.: Life, Gender, Inclusivity, and Leadership for the Future belongs to the latter category. It is not only the story of a corporate leader but also the unveiling of a truth so deeply buried that acknowledging it required dismantling an entire life and rebuilding it anew.
Katherine Dudtschak grew up in southern Ontario, the daughter of immigrants who survived World War II camps. Her early life was defined by scarcity, post-war trauma, and the kind of challenges that can press a child into becoming either brittle or unbreakably determined. She chose the latter. Despite learning difficulties and the weight of expectation, she carved out a path into one of Canada’s most competitive industries, rising to the upper echelons of banking. To the outside world, she had it all: four children, a successful career, the respect of peers, and material security. But inside, something essential was missing. The man her colleagues and friends saw was a mask, and behind it lived Katherine, the woman she had always known herself to be.
The turning point came unexpectedly, in the most ordinary of settings: her daughter’s university dormitory. There, on a wall, hung a poster about gender inclusivity. To most passersby, it was a piece of student activism, easily overlooked. For Katherine, it was a mirror. In its language, she recognized herself, the truth she had buried for decades rising suddenly, urgently, irrepressibly. That poster did not just open a door; it unlocked a life.
2026,
Canada,
English,
Katherine Dudtschak,
