A random collection of over 1910 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: "Lo que cuentan de las personas trans" (What they say about trans people) by Zulema Wild.
"This book is for those people who want to learn about trans people.
There will be people who say that we are not normal, but normal is too basic to call us that.
This book tells stories of trans people as well as a lot of information about everything that trans people experience.
A constant fight to be who we want to be, a fight to want to be accepted in a world of people who are still in the Franco era. Zulema is a trans girl and this book is dedicated to all those people who want to expand their knowledge and want to know more about trans people."
2023,
Spanish,
Zulema Wild,
Original title: "Ella era yo: Memorias de mi transición" (She was me: Memories of my transition) is the Spanish language edition of "I Heard Her Call My Name: A Memoir of Transition" by Lucy Sante.
"An iconic writer's lapidary memoir of a life spent pursuing a dream of artistic truth while evading the truth of her own gender identity, until, finally, she turned to face who she really was For a long time, Lucy Sante felt unsure of her place.
Born in Belgium, the only child of conservative working-class Catholic parents who transplanted their little family to the United States, she felt at home only when she moved to New York City in the early 1970s and found her people among a band of fellow bohemians. Some would die young, to drugs and AIDS, and some would become jarringly famous. Sante flirted with both fates, on her way to building an estimable career as a writer. But she still felt like her life a performance. She was presenting a façade, even to herself."
2024,
Interview,
Lucy Sante,
Spanish,
Original title: "Travesti. Una teoría lo suficientemente buena" (Transvestite. A good enough theory) by Marlene Wayar.
"This book proposes a living, communitarian theory. Because when Marlene Wayar says that she has a cemetery in her head, she speaks from the strength that the experience of her entire collective gives her. And that force is oral. With dialogues, she weaves bridges between the oral and the written, and she does so with a power that the written could never capture.
Between conversations, the book invites us to feel without anesthesia from the trans-South American perspective and to think critically about the failure of the world as we know it. It is a cry that envelops the life of the body while inviting us to consider the death of the marks on our bodies promoted by hetero-winca-patriarchy. Actually, Marlene proposes that we kill those pains with daily oblivion and go and build other movable languages that fill us with energy, an energy that ethics imposes that we use in children and adolescents."
2019,
Marlene Wayar,
Spanish,
Original title: "La mujer volcán: Memorias" (The Volcano Woman: Memoirs) by Carla Antonelli and Marcos Dosantos.
Carla Antonelli, an unredeemed activist and protagonist of laws that changed a country forever, has broken all the glass ceilings of trans women. This book is his incandescent account of a life plagued by struggle that travels the paths of abandonment, desire, freedom, and power. In the pages of this journey, there is hunger, love, conquests, and mistreatment; sworn enemies and infinite friendships.
Carla Antonelli (Carla Delgado Gómez) was born in Güímar, Tenerife, in 1959. She is a politician, activist, and actress. Currently a Senator of the Spanish Parliament for Más Madrid, she was a regional deputy for the Socialist Party between 2011 and 2021, becoming the first trans parliamentarian in Spain. Since the 80s, she has played numerous roles and cameos in television series, films, documentaries, and plays (Lisístrata, El síndrome de Ulises, La Veneno, El comisario, Paquita Salas, Periodistas, Triángulos rosas, Hijos de papá, El viaje de Carla…).
2024,
Carla Antonelli,
Marcos Dosantos,
Spanish,
Original title: "Furia travesti: Diccionario Travesti de la T a la T" (Travesti Fury: Travesti Dictionary from la T to la T) by Marlene Wayar.
"This book is a rallying cry against all those discourses that seek to deny transvestite identity, subsuming it in one of the two poles of the hetero binarism. Being transgender, says the author, has nothing to do with being born in a wrong body that needs to be intervened to normalize, make it thinkable, digestible for the binary stomach of a society that is as two-minded as it is hypocritical.
This book is also about the life that is presented for the first time; An experience that is related to the support of militancy in favor of the rights of transgenders as a group. It is, therefore, a cry that is both individual and collective. With a sharp tongue, clarity, and fierceness, Marlene Wayar weaves in these pages a reasoned and lucid exposition of what it means to be a Latin American transgender today: expelled even as children by the institution of the family, they will be migrants all their lives, marginalized, prostitutes. But also beings of enormous charm and beauty, intelligence, attractiveness, and seduction. Like all of them, all of them: they are what they are. And this book, for the first time, gives them the place they deserve."
2019,
Argentina,
Marlene Wayar,
Spanish,
Original title: "(h)amor 6: trans" ((h)love 6: trans) by Alana Portero (Author), Pol Galofre Molero (Author), Ártemis López (Author), Coco Wiener (Author), Roberta Marrero (Author), Iki Yos Piña Narváez funes (Author), Coco Guzmán (Author), Sabrina Sánchez (Author), Teo Pardo (Author), Elsa Ruiz (Author), Alicia Ramos (Author), Jenifer Rubí (Author), and Lucas Platero.
"What happens when we approach desire beyond binary categories? Is care crossed by gender? What relationship exists between identity, orientation and sexual politics? How to take charge of the intersection of gender, class, race? Thirteen voices put body, affection and writing to try to provide answers to these and other questions in this collaborative volume, (h)amor 6_trans. A diverse set of reflections with the same demand, that of a full life, one that deserves to be lived and mourned."
2023,
Alana Portero,
Alicia Ramos,
Ártemis López,
Coco Guzmán,
Coco Wiener,
Elsa Ruiz,
Jenifer Rubí,
Lucas Platero,
Pol Galofre Molero,
Roberta Marrero,
Sabrina Sánchez,
Spanish,
Teo Pardo,
Original title: "Poesía Recuperada" (Recovered Poetry) by Naty Menstrual.
This is Naty Menstrual's third book, entitled "Poesía recuperada", a material that compiles her initial texts created before her official birth as Naty. "These are things I wrote before I cross-dressed, before I was Naty," she said. It is the compendium of "secret" poems, which she herself never believed could be published, but which today she decided to present to society.
"If I were a woman, I would have a thousand children, I would have a thousand children
with a thousand different men.
If I were a woman, I'd have a thousand men, With a thousand red velvet kisses, Tangled on my lips, No rush and no time, Walking through me.
If I were a woman, I'd sleep among a thousand bodies, Entangled in a thousand tentacles of love, With passion, with pain, and with sweat, Sweats of a thousand men
skin, smells, licks, kisses."
2017,
Argentina,
Crossdressing,
Naty Menstrual,
Spanish,
Original title: "A way to Queer (Una senda hacia lo singular): Siempre diferente. Siempre rebelde. Siempre yo" (A way to Queer: Always different. Always rebellious. Always me) by Ayran N.
"Some days I look like a boy who over the years has realized that he feels better functioning as a girl, and other days I feel like a girl trapped in a boy's body. The difference is subtle, but it exists. And sow doubt...
This is how Ayran begins in her particular declaration of intentions. This work collects the written entries from her weblog, from its creation until its final abandonment. In the book, we will experience with straying frankness the daily drama that lives a person with gender dysphoria, as well as the desire to find a place in a society that is cruel and intolerant to those who cannot fit into its solid stereotyped labels."
"Mi hijo en rosa" (My Son in Pink) is the Spanish language edition of "Mio figlio in rosa" (My Son in Pink) by Camilla Vivian.
"Confronting different people and places has taught me to understand and accept diversity, but above all, it has made me become a curiosity junkie. This is the conclusion Camila reaches after verifying that her son has always felt the desire to be a girl.
In fact, far from putting any obstacle or obstacle, Camila decides to take her son's hand and help him during the process of searching for his own identity, a path during which they will have to face numerous prejudices and the lack of information that characterize the world around them."
2017,
Camilla Vivian,
Spanish,
Original title: "La torre de marfil 2: Experiencias de una niña transsexual" (The Ivory Tower: Experiences of a Transsexual Girl 2) by Ernesto Rubio Sánchez.
"This second part of "La torre de marfil" invites the reading public to fully delve into the development of the central character's life, accompanying her from her childhood to her adulthood in the midst of the Movida Madrileña and in a time marked by discrimination where there was no concept of transsexuality and all sexual behavior towards the same gender was synonymous with AIDS.
Within this medium, our character will try to assert her right to live as she perceives herself. Can she make it? And if so, in an environment that will demand her courage, conviction and militancy, will she enjoy the same rights as everyone else or will she continue to be a second-class citizen? However, this fight does not end on the last page of this installment; In the next one, titled Ramón is my daughter, the characters and their stories will mature, always trying to manage their lives in a society that, despite proclaiming itself progressive, still hides the prejudice of a divided world."
2022,
Ernesto Rubio Sánchez,
Spanish,
Original title: "Versos Arcoíris" (Rainbow Verses) by Loana Leona.
"This book is a collection of poetry and poetic prose that celebrates diversity, identity, and love in all its forms. In these pages, you will find a journey through the unique and personal experiences of a trans woman who has fought for acceptance and freedom, self-love, and exploring her sexuality.
Through her verses, Loana invites us to reflect on the beauty of diversity and the importance of inclusion.
This book is an invitation to embrace the uniqueness of each person and celebrate the richness of life in all its forms.
"Rainbow Colors" offers a wide range of themes and emotions, from the deep and reflective to the passionate and liberating. With titles such as "Guerrera sagrada", "Universo interior", "Identidad en construcció" and "La Constelación del Amor", each poem is a sample of the variety of experiences that encompasses the life of a trans person.
We invite you to immerse yourself in the magic of Loana's poetry and let yourself be carried away by the strength and beauty of these words. Open your eyes and your heart to the "Versos Arcoíris" and discover the strength, passion, and love that reside in each of us."
2023,
Loana Leona,
Spanish,
Original title: "Mujeres trans*, violencia y cárcel" (Trans* Women, Violence and Prison) by Chloé Constant.
"From a critical feminist perspective, in this work the author presents methodological reflections on socio-anthropological work in prison and analyzes the experiences of trans* women who were imprisoned in a men's prison in Mexico City. Through a transdisciplinary dialogue, which recovers the perspective of experiences from body and gender studies, she explores the multiple forms of violence that trans * women have experienced before, during and after prison.
Likewise, she shows how the prison constitutes an institution permeated by power and organized according to specific laws, which reproduces and deepens gender inequalities and transphobic violence, attempting to impose a unique way of living gender. This book contributes to studies on the prison system and gender violence in Mexico, showing us how trans* women face social structures that constrain and violate them, and how they explore spaces for resistance."
2022,
Chloé Constant,
Mexico,
Spanish,
Original title: "Transexualismo: Cuerpo e Identidad" (Transsexualism: Body and Identity) by Gregorio Morassutti Germán Ismael.
"This book addresses the theme of transsexualism from a comprehensive level, taking genetic, social, environmental, and psychological aspects. The objective of this study is to describe the information that deals with transsexualism, encompassing a heterogeneous view of transgenderism, transvestism, transsexualism, and hermaphroditism.
The book is organized into the following parts: practical and theoretical, your time is divided into five chapters. The first is a way of introducing the theme of sexuality and gender. The second defines theories about transsexualism. The third differentiates the transvestism, transsexualism, and hermaphroditism terms. The fourth describes different manuals with diagnostical criteria. The fifth and last provides a presentation of a clinical case with analysis."
2012,
Gregorio Morassutti Germán Ismael,
Spanish,
Original title: "Memorias, identidades y experiencias trans: (In)visibilidades entre Argentina y España" (Memories, identities and trans experiences: (In)visibilities between Argentina and Spain) by Jorge Luis Peralta and Rafael M. Mérida Jiménez.
"Visible but, at the same time, invisible: this paradoxical condition has marked and continues to mark the existence of trans people. Consequently, the reconstruction of possible genealogies comes up against a certain void in terms of representations, especially if they are first-person accounts, not mediated by an "other" alien to the social and sexual reality of transvestites, transsexuals and transgenders.
This book aims to offer an interdisciplinary look at the trans universe in Argentina and Spain from the 1960s to the beginning of this millennium. The aim is to contribute to the rescue and recovery of voices and experiences, both through textual and sociological analysis or historiographical reconstruction, as well as testimonies that illuminate, in the first person, the various itineraries of transvestism, transsexuality, and transgenderism.
2015,
Argentina,
Camila Sosa Villada,
Kim Pérez,
Lohana Berkins,
Naty Menstrual,
Spain,
Spanish,
Original title: "Tierra amarga" (Bitter Land) by Kayla Casanova.
"Kayla's journey begins in the south of dark Italy in the 80s. As a being of light that she has been since she was born, she decided to seek her true happiness. Always happy, positive and with a different vision of life, she will manage to overcome the obstacles that she will encounter from bullying, anorexia, homophobia, transphobia and all the other phobias that will come across in her life.
But nothing manages to break her goal, but instead gives her energy to turn her into what she is today, a being of peace, with enough spark and strength to face any setback that she or those around her may suffer."
2022,
Italy,
Kayla Casanova,
Spanish,
Original title: "Continuadísimo" (Continuity) by Naty Menstrual.
"Naty Menstrual writes tales of grotesque lust but tinged with the tender piety with which the best popular chroniclers usually wrap their creatures. Her scatological eroticism has antecedents as remarkable as Quevedo, who wrote Gracias y desgracias del ojo del culo and Aristophanes, who put a black pudding seller as the protagonist of his comedy Los caballeros.
With narrative dexterity, Naty Menstrual passes through the noses of readers new flowers of evil who, with their crooked heels and tired wigs, know how to wrest a touch of comedy from the melodrama of life: their names are Sabrina Duncan, Mr Ed, Sissy Lobato, Marlene Brigitte... If Clara Better, the prostitute-poet invented by César Tiempo, had met them at a crossroads of fictions, she would have stopped yirring to work indoors. I could never have competed with so much ingenuity of living, so much extracted from bad luck, so much golden shower of black kisses in a perpetual frenzy.
Maria Moreno"
2008,
Argentina,
Naty Menstrual,
Spanish,
Original title: "La Revolución de las Mariposas" (The Butterfly Revolution) by Alicia Ruiz, Las Mochas, Lucía Fuster Pravato, Marlene Wayar, Gabriela Mansilla, Karina Nazábal, Alan Otto Prieto, Sebastian Amaro, Alba Rueda, Say Sacayán, Dario Arias, Emiliano Litardo, and Paula Viturro.
"The Butterfly Revolution. Ten years after The Deed of the Proper Name. An investigation into the situation of the trans population in the City of Buenos Aires. It was developed jointly by the Gender and Sexual Diversity Program, the Divino Tesoro Foundation and the Mocha Celis Trans Popular High School. It seeks to warn about the need to continue with the design and implementation of policies that effectively contribute to the recognition of the trans community as subjects of rights."
2013,
Alan Otto Prieto,
Alicia Ruiz,
Argentina,
Gabriela Mansilla,
Karina Nazábal,
Las Mochas,
Lucía Fuster Pravato,
Marlene Wayar,
Sebastian Amaro,
Spanish,
Original title: "TRANSBARCELONAS: Cultura, género y sexualidad en la España del siglo XX" (Transbarcelonas: culture, gender and sexuality in the Spain of the twentieth century) by Rafael M. Mérida Jiménez.
"The 1970s have been colonized in Spain by the official discourse of the Transition, by political change and the construction of democracy. And like any process of colonization, it has been destructive and deceitful: the trans reality has been as ignored as it has been marginalized.
Thus, Barcelona's trans capital status was not only in the nightclubs, but also in its cinemas and streets. The Spanish political transition was very trans for multiple reasons, during a few years in which fantasy or desire prevailed over good sense and calculation, when some of the political and cultural initiatives that best replicated the reformist, pactist and prudent discourse were born.
2016,
Rafael M. Mérida Jiménez,
Spanish,
"Follando con mujeres trans" (Fucking trans women) is the Spanish language edition of "Fucking Trans Women: A Zine About the Sex Lives of Trans Women" by Mira Bellwether.
"Mira's groundbreaking text is not so much a guide on how to have sex as a trans person or with a trans person, but what trans culture can teach us about sex and sexuality. Trans culture is consent, exploration, knowing and loving each other, fluidity and romance. Mira captures this wisdom in his text, from the little-known practice of "muffing" to toys, anatomy, communication, friendship, and more."
According to Wikipedia, "Fucking Trans Women (FTW) is a zine created by Mira Bellwether. A single 80-page issue, numbered "#0", was published in October 2010 and republished in 2013 as Fucking Trans Women: A Zine About the Sex Lives of Trans Women; further issues were planned, but none had been published as of Bellwether's death in December 2022.
Bellwether wrote all of the issue's articles, which explore a variety of sexual activities involving trans women, primarily ones who are pre-op or non-op with respect to bottom surgery. Fucking Trans Women was the first publication of note to focus on sex with trans women and was innovative in its focus on trans women's own perspectives and its inclusion of instructions for many of the sex acts depicted".
2023,
Mira Bellwether,
Spanish,
Original title: "La felicidad es terrible" (Happiness is Terrible) by Lizy Tagliani.
"At some point in 2021, Hernán Casciari realized that Lizy Tagliani was (in addition to a lot of things) a writer. She was on the radio program Perros de la calle. The two shared that space and Casciari was fascinated by the way Lizy recounted the anecdotes that made up her life. In an intuitive and masterful way, each story had an introduction, conflict and outcome, with the detail that all these stories exhibited the surreal and terrible way in which Lizy had carried out her existence.
Convinced that these narratives could not literally remain in the air, Casciari decided to transfer Lizy's world to paper. For that, together with Josefina Licitra—editor of Orsai and this book—they met with Lizy several times, recorder in hand, and asked her to tell the story of her life from the beginning. The result is this book: an editorial record of the wonderful novel (crazy and coherent, hilarious and dark) that Lizy kept in her head. And today, like an exquisite banquet, it reaches the hands of readers. Let them enjoy it."
2022,
Argentina,
Lizy Tagliani,
Spanish,
