Transgender Biographies

Showing posts with label English. Show all posts

Jessie Parker - Still Here, Still Becoming

Full title: "Still Here, Still Becoming" by Jessie Parker.

In a world that often demands certainty and clarity, Jessie Parker offers something far more honest and healing in her book Still Here, Still Becoming: vulnerability, evolution, and truth told in motion. This stirring collection of essays is not a triumphalist memoir nor a neat blueprint of trans identity. Instead, it is something rarer and more necessary, an invitation into the beautiful, messy, and resilient becoming of one transgender woman who refuses to be anything other than fully, unapologetically herself.

At the heart of Still Here, Still Becoming is Parker’s unwavering commitment to truth-telling, even when it hurts. Each essay opens a window into her inner world and lived experiences as a trans woman navigating a society that is too often hostile, indifferent, or simply unprepared to understand. But this is not a book solely about suffering. Yes, Parker addresses the heartbreak, confusion, and pain of living in a body, and a world, that sometimes feels at odds with one's identity. But she also writes about joy. Real joy. Loud, earned, glittering joy that bursts forth in moments of connection, affirmation, love, and self-recognition. From the earliest pages, Parker’s prose is intimate, generous, and deeply reflective. “I didn’t write this book because I have all the answers,” she tells us. “I wrote it because I’ve lived the questions.” That statement captures not only the tone of the book, but its very ethos.

Rae Elle Riley - Just Nod If You Can Hear Me

Full title: "Just Nod If You Can Hear Me: A Memoir" by Rae Elle Riley.

There are memoirs that explain. There are memoirs that reflect. And then, once in a very long while, there’s a memoir that doesn’t ask for permission, doesn’t wait for understanding, and certainly doesn’t smooth over the jagged parts. Instead, it grabs you by the collar, shoves you into its world, and demands that you feel every splinter of bone-deep truth embedded in its prose.

Rae Elle Riley’s Just Nod If You Can Hear Me is that memoir. From the very first page, we meet Chuck Keiran, a steamfitter, a brawler, a man etched from grit and gasoline, your classic blue-collar antihero clinging to life in a rust-soaked world of factories, unions, and dive bars. But Chuck is not who he seems. Beneath the hard exterior and years of camouflage lives Rae, a trans woman buried under the wreckage of a life built to survive everyone else’s expectations. Rae doesn’t step out of the shadows gently. She explodes into them, armed with nothing but her truth, her pain, and her art. Just Nod If You Can Hear Me doesn’t offer a redemptive arc in the traditional sense. There are no clean breaks, no sudden epiphanies, no “and then everything was fine” ribbon to tie it all up. Instead, Riley offers readers a series of emotional detonations, each chapter a blowtorch to shame, silence, and societal erasure.

Tess Juliana - Just Tess

Full title: "Just Tess: A Trans Female's Journey to Womanhood" by Tess Juliana.

In Just Tess: A Trans Female's Journey to Womanhood, author Tess Juliana opens a window into the tender, complex, and deeply human evolution of identity, soul, and purpose. This memoir is not just a record of transition from male to female, but a spiritual and emotional chronicle of duality, of two spirits, Jules and Tess, walking side by side until they could become one. Tess Juliana’s life is anything but ordinary.

Born with what many Indigenous cultures would call the gift of "Two Spirits," she navigated much of her early life as Jules, a man who served honorably in the United States Air Force as an air traffic controller. Jules' military career included a transformative year in remote Greenland, an experience that sparked a lifelong passion for geology and the Arctic's harsh and magnificent landscapes. That same passion carried him into a decades-long career in science education, during which he earned degrees in geology, science education, and biology. But science and adventure were only half the story. In Just Tess, the reader travels not only through physical terrain, across glaciers, mountains, and oceans, but also through the interior landscapes of longing, silence, love, fear, and truth.

Rachel Dover - And She Was: A Memoir of Transition

Full title: "And She Was: A Memoir of Transition" by Rachel Dover.

In her courageous and deeply affecting memoir, Growing A Pair: My Life, My Way, My Words, Rachel Dover invites readers into the messy, beautiful, and unflinchingly honest terrain of self-discovery. Following the same heartfelt tone that characterized her earlier writing in And She Was, Rachel expands her story with remarkable vulnerability, painting a vivid portrait of what it means to reclaim your truth after a lifetime of denial, self-sabotage, and quiet despair.

Through raw reflections, wry humour, and moments of profound insight, Rachel charts the winding path of her gender transition with compassion, grace, and a voice all her own. Rachel came out as transgender in mid-2018, after enduring years of self-destructive behaviour and internal struggle. Her turning point? A quiet, powerful revelation in therapy, that she could give herself permission to be who she truly was. That act of self-permission, so deceptively simple yet life-altering, became the cornerstone of the life she would go on to build. Growing A Pair explores this transition not only in terms of gender, but also in terms of reclaiming joy, purpose, and personal agency. It is not a how-to manual, but it is a beacon of hope for others navigating similar storms.

Ashley J. Webb - I Am Ashley

Full title: "I Am Ashley: A True Story of Growing Up Trans in a World That Said I Couldn’t Be Her" by Ashley J. Webb.

I Am Ashley: A True Story of Growing Up Trans in a World That Said I Couldn’t Be Her by Ashley J. Webb stands as a defiant beacon of courage and visibility in a world that too often demands conformity and silences those who dare to live authentically. This is not merely a story of gender transition or personal triumph, it is a raw, unapologetic journey of survival against the tides of erasure, misunderstanding, and systemic oppression.

Ashley was born intersex and assigned male at birth in New England, raised within a framework that could neither understand nor accommodate her true self. For decades, she navigated life burdened by medical mysteries, misdiagnoses, and the agonizing invisibility imposed by a society that refused to name or see her reality. Her memoir reads like a flame, burning through confusion, repression, and shame, illuminating the path toward self-realization and empowerment. “I didn’t transition for attention,” Ashley writes, “I transitioned to survive.” This powerful declaration sets the tone for a memoir that is as much about survival as it is about identity. The journey Ashley recounts is not one of a quiet, smooth self-discovery, but rather a fierce fight, against silence, against shame, and against systems built to keep people like her invisible.

Julia Shelton - Becoming Me: A Trans Memoir

Full title: "Becoming Me: A Trans Memoir - A Trans Woman’s Guide to Radical Self-Love" by Julia Shelton.

What if becoming yourself wasn’t about changing who you are, but coming home to the truth you’ve always known? This is the question at the heart of Julia Shelton’s bold and unflinching debut, Becoming Me: A Trans Memoir – A Trans Woman’s Guide to Radical Self-Love. Part lyrical memoir, part defiant manifesto, Shelton’s book is a raw, radiant chronicle of survival, self-discovery, and sacred transformation.

With the grace of a poet and the grit of a woman who has walked through fire, Julia invites readers not only to witness her journey but to begin (or deepen) their own. Becoming Me opens with a tender, painful recollection of childhood, a time when gender was both a secret truth and a source of silent shame. Shelton paints early life with aching honesty: the confusion of being assigned male, the ache of invisibility, the early traumas that left her unmoored long before she had the language to name her reality. Her story is neither linear nor sanitized, and that’s what makes it so powerful. It is nonlinear healing. It is poetry breaking into prose. It is a woman wrestling with, and eventually embracing, the parts of herself the world told her to bury.

Riki Wilchins - Bad Ink

Full title: "Bad Ink: How The New York Times Sold Out Transgender Teens" by Riki Anne Wilchins.

In Bad Ink: How The New York Times Sold Out Transgender Teens, award-winning activist and author Riki Anne Wilchins delivers a deeply researched, incisive, and unflinching exposé on how one of the world’s most respected newspapers abandoned its progressive stance on transgender rights in favor of what can only be described as a calculated campaign against transgender youth.

This book is not merely a critique of journalistic missteps, it is a bold indictment of systemic bias, media complicity, and the devastating impact such narratives have on the lives of vulnerable young people. Through clear-eyed analysis and chilling documentation, Wilchins shows how the New York Times became not just a passive observer of the backlash against trans rights, but an active participant. Wilchins traces the roots of this ideological shift to 2015, just as A. G. Sulzberger was rising to power as the new Publisher. Up to that point, the Times had been a relatively consistent supporter of transgender rights. But under Sulzberger’s tenure, something changed. The coverage took a sharp and disturbing turn.

Maya Ova - Sea Changes

Full title: "Sea Changes: Journal of A Transgender Woman" by Maya Ova.

Maya Ova’s Sea Changes: Journal of a Transgender Woman is not just a book, it’s a deeply textured meditation on identity, transformation, and creativity. Woven through a mosaic of journal entries, poetry, photography, and travel anecdotes, the book offers readers a window into Maya’s life as a transgender woman growing up in Southeast Asia and later navigating a global career in education and culture. It is equal parts memoir, scrapbook, and soundscape, a tribute to the many selves Maya has inhabited, and the melodies she continues to create from them.

Born and raised in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, Maya grew up in the ever-expanding urban sprawl of a city constantly reinventing itself, a mirror to her own fluid evolution. As a child, Maya knew she was different. She wished she had been born a girl and carried that silent truth through a world not built for easy honesty. “I grew up in a modest urban landscape, albeit with little resources available,” she writes. “I would look at my friends who play the piano, arguing whose music centre is better while I itched to learn how pressing each key would sound like.”

Michael Devitt and Angie Devitt - Finding Eve

Full title: "Finding Eve: Raising a transgender teen in Idaho" by Michael Devitt and Angie Devitt.

In the heart of one of America’s most conservative states, a powerful, deeply personal, and transformative story has emerged. Finding Eve: Raising a Transgender Teen in Idaho (2024) by Michael and Angie Devitt is more than a memoir, it's a clarion call for compassion, understanding, and bravery. It tells the story of their daughter, Eve Devitt, an extraordinary young woman whose courage and authenticity have inspired not only her family and community but countless others across the nation.

Set in Boise, Idaho, Finding Eve begins with a quiet but growing storm, the dawning awareness that their child, assigned male at birth, was experiencing something deeper and more profound than confusion or rebellion. What unfolds is a story of gender dysphoria recognized not as a problem to be solved, but as a truth to be honored. As Eve begins to articulate her experience and identity, her parents are confronted with questions many families of transgender youth face: What does it mean to be supportive? How do you protect your child from a world that isn’t ready? Michael and Angie do not sugarcoat their journey. The book walks readers through the complexity of coming out within a family that, like many, was unprepared for what lay ahead. Their daughter’s transition challenged their assumptions, tested their relationships, and required a level of self-reflection and vulnerability that few parenting books prepare you for. But through honest conversations and unwavering love, the Devitts transformed what could have been a breaking point into a source of incredible strength.

Full title: "A Woman in Progress" by Barbara Marie Minney.

Barbara Marie Minney’s A Woman in Progress is not simply a poetry collection, it is a radiant, defiant, and deeply human memoir-in-verse that speaks to transformation, faith, pain, and joy with fearless authenticity. Winner of the 2024 American Fiction Award for Poetry Chapbook and an Eric Hoffer Award nominee, this chapbook reveals the tender interior of a poet who has walked through fire and emerged, not unscarred, but empowered.

Minney’s fourth collection may be slim in size, but it contains worlds, worlds shaped by courage, longing, fierce love, and a hard-earned sense of self. Minney is a seventh-generation Appalachian, a retired attorney, and a proud transgender woman who began her transition at the age of sixty-three after decades of repression. As she shared in her candid interview with Heroines of My Life, poetry became her means of survival and resistance, “a way to document and process my thoughts, feelings, struggles, and triumphs.” A Woman in Progress charts the earliest years of that journey, unfolding like a spiritual testimony, an act of prayer, and a series of intimate conversations with the self and the reader.

Shiro Deng - Julie Lemieux: Canada's First Transgender Mayor

Full title: "Julie Lemieux: Canada's First Transgender Mayor - Unauthorized" by Shiro Deng.

In Julie Lemieux: Canada’s First Transgender Mayor – Unauthorized, author Shiro Deng chronicles one of the most quietly groundbreaking political careers in Canadian history. With sensitivity, depth, and journalistic curiosity, Deng paints a vivid portrait of Julie Lemieux, a soft-spoken, community-oriented cabinetmaker turned trailblazing public servant, who reshaped a rural Quebec village and, along the way, Canadian politics. Julie Lemieux's story is not one of grand speeches or sweeping national headlines, but of grassroots transformation.

A former Drummondville cabinetmaker, she moved to the village of Très-Saint-Rédempteur in 2009 seeking a slower, more connected life. It wasn’t politics that brought her there, but wood, peace, and community. But the heart of this story, and the heart of Deng’s book, lies in the way Lemieux responded when her community needed her most. The turning point came in the form of a church. When the beloved, but disused, Roman Catholic church at the village center was slated for demolition, Lemieux led the fight to preserve and transform it into a community and cultural hub. That victory sparked her political awakening, and in 2013, she was elected to the municipal council. Four years later, she would make history by becoming Canada’s first openly transgender mayor, and the first woman elected mayor of Très-Saint-Rédempteur.

Tshiamo Modisane - I Am Tshiamo

Full title: "I Am Tshiamo: My Transition to Self-acceptance and Womanhood" by Tshiamo Modisane.

In her heartfelt and powerful memoir I Am Tshiamo, Tshiamo Modisane invites readers on a deeply personal journey of self-discovery, identity, and resilience. Growing up as Kgositsile, a name meaning “king,” Tshiamo always knew she was a girl, despite the gender assigned to her at birth. Born into a conservative Christian family in the townships of KwaThema and Daveyton near Johannesburg, Modisane faced immense pressure to conform to societal and cultural expectations for a boy.

As the child of a pastor, she was expected to embody a narrow and traditional image of masculinity. Instead, she was met with scorn, misunderstanding, and even abuse, from relatives, friends, peers, and strangers alike. But even from a young age, Tshiamo showed remarkable courage, beginning to make bold choices at just five years old. Her story is one of both doubt and fierce self-belief, culminating in her gender-affirming surgery in her thirties. With unshakable sass, faith, and a sparkle of confidence drawn from her family’s ties to the entertainment world, she transitioned from male to female while establishing a successful career as an actress, celebrity stylist, and Lux’s first gender-non-conforming brand ambassador. More than a tale of transition, I Am Tshiamo is a meditation on faith, defiance, pain, and hope. Modisane writes with both vulnerability and strength, dissecting the scars of her past and honoring the truth of her present.

Caroline Litman - Her Name Is Alice

Full title: "Her Name Is Alice: A new 2025 memoir exploring grief, love and the transgender experience, from the mother of Alice Litman" by Caroline Litman.

Her Name Is Alice is a poignant memoir by Caroline Litman, sharing the heartrending journey of her daughter Alice’s life, transition, and untimely death. This deeply personal account sheds light on the challenges faced by transgender individuals and their families. Alice Litman died by suicide in May 2022 at the age of 20, after waiting nearly three years for her first appointment at a gender identity clinic. Her prolonged wait for gender-affirming healthcare significantly impacted her mental health.

In Her Name Is Alice, Caroline Litman candidly reflects on her initial struggles to accept Alice's transition, the societal stigmas they encountered, and her profound regrets. She emphasizes the urgent need for improved support systems and acceptance for transgender individuals. The memoir has garnered early praise for its unflinching honesty and emotional depth. Comedian Sofie Hagen described it as "thoughtful, beautiful, incredibly necessary," urging everyone to read it, especially those resistant to its themes. Author Richard Beard called it "uncompromising, anguished," highlighting the real victims of culture wars. Caroline Litman hopes that by sharing Alice's story, she can raise awareness about the challenges faced by transgender individuals and advocate for timely, compassionate healthcare. She states, "We can never bring Alice back, but we will keep campaigning to ensure all trans people are able to live in dignity and receive the healthcare they need and deserve." Her Name Is Alice is a testament to a mother's enduring love and a call to action for a more inclusive and supportive society.

Available via Amazon

Full title: "Warrior Princess: A U.S. Navy Seal's Journey to Coming Out Transgender" by Kristin Beck and Anne Speckhard.

Kristin Beck’s Warrior Princess: A U.S. Navy SEAL’s Journey to Coming Out Transgender, co-authored with Anne Speckhard, is a raw and deeply personal memoir that provides a rare glimpse into the life of a highly decorated Navy SEAL navigating the complexities of gender identity. The book is both an account of Beck’s distinguished military career and an exploration of the emotional and psychological turmoil she faced before embracing her true self.

Beck’s military experiences, spanning 20 years and 13 deployments, including service with the elite SEAL Team Six, make for gripping reading. She recounts intense combat situations and the unwavering camaraderie among soldiers, but beneath the valor and discipline, she harbored a profound sense of dissonance. The memoir does not shy away from detailing the pressures of hypermasculinity within the military, an environment that often left Beck feeling alienated. Her transition was not just a personal journey but a public statement that challenged deeply ingrained perceptions of gender in one of the most traditionally masculine institutions.

Munroe Bergdorf - Transitional: My Story

Full title: "Transitional: My Story" by Munroe Bergdorf.

"Transitioning is an alignment of the invisible and the physical. It is truth rising to the surface. It is one of the most fundamental aspects of the human condition - a part of our experience as a conscious being, no matter who we are. As time goes on, we all develop as people. We all transition. It's what unites us, not what separates us.

In this life-affirming, heartfelt and intimate book, activist and model Munroe Bergdorf shares reflections from her own life to illustrate how transitioning is an essential part of all our lives. Through the story of one woman's extraordinary mission to live with authenticity, Transitional shows us how to heal, how to build a stronger community and how to evolve as a society out of shame and into pride."

Julia James - World's First Transgender Married Couple...

Full title: "World's First Transgender Married Couple "Open"" by Julia James.

"Explore the extraordinary true story of a trailblazing couple who redefined love, marriage, and identity. They were among the last within the LGBT community to feel secure enough to share their lives with the world, a revelation that came years after the LGB individuals had done so.

"The World's First Transgender Married Couple" offers an invitation to witness the heartfelt, moving journey of two individuals who transitioned not only in gender but in their outlook on life, love, and commitment. This landmark memoir ventures into the less-discussed facets of transgender identity and applauds the triumph of authentic self-expression in a world still adjusting to change.

Colleen Bellson - And Here I Am

Full title: "And Here I Am: My Seventy Years On A Gender Tightrope" by Colleen Bellson.

"“Gender dysphoria”. “Transgender”. I'm older than both of those terms. You'd think that with nearly eight decades of experience, I'd understand the condition a lot more than I do. If you're looking for answers here, it's best that you not get your hopes up. I gave up on finding the "why" a very long time ago. For me, being "transgender" has been a gift, a curse, a source of both shame and fascination, and - on balance - a great deal of fun.

This book has nothing to do with politics, ideology, activism, legal battles, parental rights, or any other issue that's peripheral to the subject of gender self-identity. If you learn something along the way, that's great. But my intent is just to tell my own story."

Nicole Maines - It Gets Better . . . Except When It Gets Worse

Full title: "It Gets Better . . . Except When It Gets Worse: And Other Unsolicited Truths I Wish Someone Had Told Me" by Nicole Maines.

"Nicole Maines knows a little something about “happily ever after”—not just because she’s a self-professed expert in the Disney princess canon, but because she’s lived it. After coming out at an early age, her family had not only to educate themselves, but also those around them as they fought and won a landmark court case in the state of Maine before she graduated high school. She made it into college, got the guy, and finally had The Surgery.

She achieved her lifelong goal of becoming an actress when she landed a major role in the CW’s Supergirl, playing television’s very first live-action transgender superhero. Cue sappy music and sunsets, because we’ve got ourselves a happy ending, right? Ha! As if. For the first time, in her own words, Nicole tells the story of her journey from childhood in rural Maine to the spotlights of Hollywood, sharing the lessons she’s learned along the way. With clever wit and unflinching honesty, she tackles some of the most insidious messaging absorbed by queer kids and all young women, from the idea that any one thing can (or should) ever really “fix” you, to wondering what’s wrong with you when things don’t always feel better, and reminding us that, sometimes, a happy ending is only the beginning of the story."

Jennifer Finney Boylan - Cleavage: Men, Women...

Full title: "Cleavage: Men, Women, and the Space Between Us" by Jennifer Finney Boylan.

"What is the difference between men and women? Jennifer Finney Boylan, bestselling author of She's Not There and co-author of Mad Honey with Jodi Picoult, examines the divisions--as well as the common ground--between the genders, and reflects on her own experiences, both difficult and joyful, as a transgender American.

Jennifer Finney Boylan's She's Not There was the first bestselling work written by a transgender American. Since its publication twenty years ago, she has become the go-to person for insight into the impact of gender on our lives, from the food we eat to the dreams we dream, both for ourselves and for our children. But Cleavage is more than a deep dive into gender identity; it's also a look at the difference between coming out as trans in 2000--when many people reacted to Boylan's transition with love--and the present era of blowback and fear. How does gender affect our sense of self? Our body image? The passage of time? The friends we lose--and keep?"

Tommy Dorfman - Maybe This Will Save Me

Full title: "Maybe This Will Save Me: A Memoir of Art, Addiction and Transformation" by Tommy Dorfman.

"From filmmaker, writer, producer and actor Tommy Dorfman—currently starring in Broadway's Romeo + Juliet—comes a beautifully written, bracingly original memoir, structured through the profound revelations of a single tarot card reading, chronicling her troubled teen years, the highs and lows of her creative career, and her journey to self-acceptance On a hot summer day, twenty-eight-year-old Tommy Dorfman was enjoying a beautiful outing on a boat. But inside she felt unmoored.

After a lifetime of confusion, she’d finally gained clarity around her gender and had begun to transition. But there were still parts of herself she’d locked away, elements of her story that she needed, for the first time, to fully confront. She sought guidance in a tarot deck, using it as a tool to make sense of her life up until that point. Maybe This Will Save Me, Dorfman’s spellbinding debut memoir, is structured through the cards of that tarot pull. The youngest of five children, she grappled with her own identity from an early age and spent her teenage years numbed by drugs and alcohol. At the same time, she harbored dreams of creative stardom and a desire to make herself seen."

My Blog List

Books by Year

Search for a book