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.
Full title: "The Quiet Defiance" by Rosie Stokes.
The Quiet Defiance by Rosie Stokes is the kind of memoir that speaks softly while leaving a lasting echo. It does not shout for attention, it does not posture or perform, it simply tells the truth, and that truth is powerful enough on its own. Rosie’s story unfolds with an honesty that feels almost radical, especially because so much of her life was spent learning how not to be honest, at least not with the world, and often not even with herself.
Rosie Stokes was born into the constant motion of a public house in Poole, Dorset, a place full of voices, expectations, and unspoken rules about what strength should look like. From an early age, she was sensitive in an environment that rewarded toughness and emotional restraint. This tension between who she was and who she was expected to be would become the defining undercurrent of her life. The book captures this beautifully, showing how early lessons about endurance and silence can shape a person long before they have the words to explain their discomfort.
2025,
English,
Rosie Stokes,
UK,
Full title: "A Life of Extremes To Dreams: The Autobiography and Journals of a Post-Op Transgender Female" by Michelle Conybeer.
A Life of Extremes To Dreams: The Autobiography and Journals of a Post-Op Transgender Female by Michelle Conybeer is not a book that asks to be consumed lightly. It asks to be felt, endured, and lived alongside its author. Rooted in Northamptonshire yet reaching far beyond any single place, this work unfolds as an intimate record of a woman who has spent a year turning away from the noise of the world to confront the truth within herself.
What emerges from those pages is not simply a memoir, but a testament to survival, self-recognition, and the slow, painful, and ultimately luminous ascent into womanhood.
Michelle’s writing carries the weight of someone who has walked through darkness without romanticising it. The journals that form the heart of this book document a journey inward, one marked by isolation, reckoning, and a fearless examination of the past. She does not glance at her shadows and move on. She sits with them, names them, and allows them to speak. Every corner of her inner world is explored and exposed, not for shock or spectacle, but because honesty demands it. The reader is invited into a space where despair is not edited out and where vulnerability is not softened for comfort.
2024,
English,
Michelle Conybeer,
UK,
Full title: "The King is Dead... Long live the Queen" by Julia Phillips.
“The King is Dead... Long Live the Queen” by Julia Phillips is not simply a book you read. It is a book you witness. From its opening pages to its quiet, devastatingly honest conclusion, it feels less like a constructed narrative and more like an open door into a life that has been lived under pressure, secrecy, longing, and finally, truth. It is a personal journal in the purest sense, unpolished where it needs to be, tender where it must be, and unflinchingly brave in its refusal to look away from pain.
At its heart, this work is a chronicle of heartbreak and love lost. It tells the story of the end of a grand romance, not in melodramatic terms, but in the slow, aching way that real love often ends. Julia writes with the clarity of someone who has had no choice but to sit with her grief, examine it from every angle, and eventually accept it. The relationship that dissolves across these pages is not treated as a failure, but as something meaningful and transformative, something that shaped her and ultimately pushed her toward a deeper reckoning with herself.
What makes the book extraordinary is that this love story runs parallel to another, more difficult one. The love story between Julia and her true self. Written as a form of therapy, the book documents a journey that spans despair, self-reflection, and frank acceptance before arriving at redemption, joy, and hope. Spread across four volumes, the journals capture the emotional reality of a trans woman confronting her gender head-on for the first time after fifty years of hiding behind a carefully constructed façade. This is not a sudden awakening or a neat moment of realization. It is a slow dismantling. When you reach the very end, all the walls fall down, and you see yourself for who you truly are.
2025,
English,
Julia Phillips,
UK,
Full title: "This is Not a Stunt" by Cath Nichols.
Cath Nichols’s poetry collection This is Not a Stunt is built on a quietly radical premise: that living with disability or being trans is not a tragedy to be overcome, nor a narrative arc that demands redemption, heroism, or exceptional suffering. Instead, these poems insist on something far more subversive, the idea that such lives are simply ways of being, full of humour, romance, irritation, longing, boredom, love, and the slow accumulation of ordinary days. Nichols embraces both the mundane and the remarkable, reminding us that “We’re middle-aged, of course. Life rolls on,” and it is precisely this rolling on that gives the collection its emotional weight.
The book moves fluidly across time and place, revisiting Nichols’s childhood in New Zealand, her teenage years in Kent, and later decades spent on the gay scene in Manchester, complete with changing fashions, haircuts, and social codes. These shifts are not treated nostalgically or sentimentally, but as lived textures, moments that shape a self without needing to explain or justify it. The poems feel grounded in experience rather than theory, even when they are engaging with ideas that are politically and philosophically charged. Bodies, identities, and relationships are presented as processes rather than destinations, as acts of becoming rather than problems to be solved.
2017,
Cath Nichols,
English,
UK,
Full title: "Ten Years: A Transexual Memoir" by Tara Hudson.
Tara Hudson’s book Ten Years: A Transexual Memoir is both a profoundly intimate personal narrative and a sharp indictment of the systems that failed her. Written with honesty and urgency, it recounts a decade of her life in which she endured not only the ordinary struggles of living openly as a transgender woman but also the extraordinary injustices of being placed in a male prison despite her identity. What emerges is a powerful chronicle of resilience and survival, but also a plea for compassion, justice, and lasting change.
Hudson begins by reflecting on her childhood and the early awareness that she was different from those around her. She describes the years of self-discovery that followed, including her work as a make-up artist, where she built a career while continuing her transition. Yet the memoir’s most searing sections revolve around her incarceration in 2015, when she was sentenced to prison and initially placed in HMP Bristol, an all-male facility. What should have been a short custodial sentence turned into a national controversy after more than 150,000 people signed a petition demanding that she be transferred to a women’s prison.
2025,
English,
Tara Hudson,
UK,
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."
2024,
English,
Munroe Bergdorf,
UK,
Full title: "Becoming Us: The inspiring memoir of transgender joy, love and family AS SEEN ON LORRAINE" Jake Graf and Hannah Graf
"This is the inspiring and moving memoir of a couple in search of a normal family life. And in many ways that have found that: married, in careers they love and parents to two beautiful children. But their journey there has been an extraordinary one.
Becoming Us is the inspiring and at times heart-breaking memoir of Jake and Hannah Graf, the UK's most visible transgender couple and family. We follow their extraordinary paths towards the 'normality' they have always longed for, as they navigate the many challenges and pitfalls along the way."
2023,
English,
Hannah Graf,
Jake Graf,
UK,
Full title: "Sugar And Spice" by Abi Austen.
"Sugar and Spice is the true story of the first and only female Parachute Regiment officer in the British Army. Dismissed from service for being transgender after a decade of decorated service, Abi Austen has gone on to become a top international diplomat and representative for the trans community. Her deeply moving autobiography tells her hard scrabble journey of self-realisation from a broken childhood of abuse and neglect."
"She reflects on the culture wars, the discrimination and hatred she has faced, and the lessons she has drawn from a life of struggle to achieve personal happiness and love. There has never been another female officer in The Parachute Regiment. Abi's story is unique, profound and a parable for our times."
2023,
Abi Austen,
English,
Northern Ireland,
UK,
Full title: "Jan Morris (Writers of Wales)" by Paul Clements.
"This is the first full-length study of Jan Morris, one of Britain's foremost travel essayist and popular historians. It takes a critical look at a unique writer who after spending more than forty years as a man, underwent a sex-change in the 1970s and became a woman.
The book outlines Morris's early life and education as James. It focuses on his early journalistic career when in 1953, as The Times correspondent, he took part in the British conquest of Everest and scooped the world with his reports. Morris's writings span nearly fifty years. Since the 1950s she has been a major figure in journalism and travel writing in both Britain and the United States.
1998,
English,
Jan Morris,
Paul Clements,
UK,
Wales,
Full title: "A Tale of Two Lives: A funny thing happened on the way to the Palace" by Helen Dale.
"Having grown up as a RAF Brat and keen scout, dreaming of being a pilot in the RAF, she concealed a secret for decades before accepting, in 1998, that she needed to transition.
Losing one job as a consequence, she joined Greater Manchester Probation in 1999. As the first openly trans employee nationally she provided awareness training for probation and prison staff and others and became the de facto lead on trans issues.
She persuaded the then Lesbian and Gay staff association to extend its membership criteria to include trans and spent several years as chair. She also helped to found a:gender — the UK pan-Civil Service trans support network and was made an honorary life member when she retired in 2015.
2021,
English,
Helen Dale,
UK,
Full title: "Transition Denied: Confronting the Crisis in Trans Healthcare" by Jane Fae.
"Trans people in the UK currently face widespread prejudice and discrimination, from how they are described in the media to the lack of healthcare support they receive. This institutional bias is illustrated by the tragic case of Synestra de Courcy, who died following neglect and rejection from the NHS, leading her to sex work to fund her transition and dangerous self-medication."
"Charting Syn's life from childhood through to her untimely death aged just 23, Jane Fae exposes the gross institutional and societal discrimination trans people experience on a daily basis and its impact on the lives of trans people young and old. Promoting honest discussion and bringing these hidden issues into the light of day, this book is a must-read for anyone interested in trans rights, and NHS accountability."
2018,
English,
Jane Fae,
Synestra de Courcy,
UK,
Full title: "Hello world, I'm Amy Kate" by Amy Kate Carter.
"Imagine waking up every day in a body and a gender that doesn't feel right. For forty-two years, this was my life. Pain, misery and depression were all I knew. Any vague semblance of a smile on my face was fake, there only to appease the people present at the time.
Gender dysphoria, and consequently being transgender, is not a choice any sane individual would make. The only real choice is how to deal with it. I faced a choice of fight to survive or leave this world in a ball of flame. I was born a boy, but as I grew it became clear to me that this was a mistake. Today, I'm a happy confident woman having undergone transition from male to female. This is my life, my story. Unapologetically me."
2021,
Amy Kate Carter,
English,
UK,
Full title: "Gender Pioneers: A Celebration of Transgender, Non-Binary and Intersex Icons" by Philippa Punchard.
"This inspiring collection of illustrated portraits celebrates the lives of influential transgender, non-binary and intersex figures throughout history. Showcasing the diversity of gender identities and expressions that have existed in all cultures alongside developments from recent years, the extraordinary stories in this book highlight the achievements and legacies of those who have fought to be themselves, whatever their gender. From activists, soldiers and historical leaders through to pirates, actors and artists, this book explores the life and times of over fifty trans and intersex trailblazers in their fight for equality, acceptance and change. Poignant, educational and empowering, these are the gender pioneers everyone needs to know about."
2022,
English,
Philippa Punchard,
UK,
Full title: "Transitional: In One Way or Another, We All Transition" 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. None of us ever becomes someone else entirely—regardless of how we identify - but nor do we stay the same forever. We all transition. It's what binds us, not what separates us.
In Transitional, activist and writer Munroe Bergdorf draws on her own experience and theory from key experts, change-makers and activists to reveal just how deeply ingrained transitioning is in human experience.
This is a book to help bring us closer to a shared consciousness: a powerful guide to how our differences can be harnessed as a tool to heal, build community, and construct a better society."
2023,
English,
Munroe Bergdorf,
UK,
Full title: "Trieste and the Meaning of Nowhere" by Jan Morris.
"Jan Morris (then James) first visited Trieste as a soldier at the end of the Second World War. Since then, the city has come to represent her own life, with all its hopes, disillusionments, loves and memories. Here, her thoughts on a host of subjects - ships, cities, cats, sex, nationalism, Jewishness, civility and kindness - are inspired by the presence of Trieste, and recorded in or between the lines of this book.
Evoking the whole of its modern history, from its explosive growth to wealth and fame under the Habsburgs, through the years of Fascist rule to the miserable years of the Cold War, when rivalries among the great powers prevented its creation as a free city under United Nations auspices, Trieste and the Meaning of Nowhere is neither a history nor a travel book; like the place, it is one of a kind."
2002,
English,
Georges Burou,
Jan Morris,
UK,
Full title: "In My Mind's Eye: A Thought Diary" by Jan Morris.
"'I have never before in my life kept a diary of my thoughts, and here at the start of my ninth decade, having for the moment nothing much else to write, I am having a go at it. Good luck to me.'
So begins this extraordinary book, a collection of diary pieces that Jan Morris wrote for the Financial Times over the course of 2017.
A former soldier and journalist, and one of the great chroniclers of the world for over half a century, she writes here in her characteristically intimate voice - funny, perceptive, wise, touching, wicked, scabrous, and above all, kind - about her thoughts on the world, and her own place in it as she turns ninety. From cats to cars, travel to home, music to writing, it's a cornucopia of delights from a unique literary figure."
2019,
English,
Georges Burou,
Jan Morris,
UK,
Full title: "Allegorizings" by Jan Morris.
"Soldier, journalist, historian, author of forty books, Jan Morris led an extraordinary life, witnessing such seminal moments as the first ascent of Everest, the Suez Canal Crisis, the Eichmann Trial, The Cuban Revolution and so much more. Now, in Allegorizings, published posthumously as was her wish, Morris looks back over some of the key moments of her life, and sees a multitude of meanings."
"From her final travels to the USA and across Europe to late journeys on her beloved trains and ships, from the deaths of her old friends Hilary and Tenzig to the enduring relationships in her own life, from reflections on identity and nations to the importance of good marmalade, it bears testimony to her uniquely kind and inquisitive take on the world."
2021,
English,
Georges Burou,
Jan Morris,
UK,
Full title: "Release the Beast: A Drag Queen's Guide to Life" by Bimini Bon Boulash.
"Bimini Bon Boulash captured hearts and minds on both sides of the Atlantic as the gag-inducing, death-dropping, plant-based breakout star of RuPaul's Drag Race UK Season 2. Not only did she make us laugh and cry, she showed us how to develop a Positive Mental Attitude and live happily and healthily outside society's idea of "normal."
Telling the story of how drag took her from the brink of self-destruction to the mainstage, as well as life lessons drawing on convention-breaking icons from Kate Moss to Katie Price, in this book Bimini uses all her wit, charm, and kindness to show us how to lead the lives we wish we could lead, through the life-changing magic of drag."
2021,
Bimini Bon Boulash,
Drag queen,
English,
UK,
Full title: "Half Him Half Her: When do I get to be ME" by Stephanie Rachael Vaughan.
"Gender, what is it exactly? It has often been said that Gender is who you go to bed 'as', whereas Sexuality is who you go to bed 'with'. But what happens if you are born 'intersex' and sit somewhere in between male and female; a situation made more complex if your parents conceal that fact from you? And what to think when you learn, more than five decades later, that you had modifying surgery when you were born?"
"Half Him Half Her is a heartfelt portrait beginning with the birth of Robin, to farming parents, in a small Yorkshire town in 1961. Ostensibly a boy, a relatively happy childhood ensues until puberty confirms some of the conflicting and troubling feelings that Robin has been experiencing. The physical and mental bullying started there. But despite his ever-increasing anxiety Robin survives through school, work life and even marriage.
2021,
Australia,
English,
Stephanie Rachael Vaughan,
UK,
Full title: "The Transgender Issue: An Argument for Justice" by Shon Faye.
"Trans people in Britain today have become a culture war 'issue'. Despite making up less than 1% of the country's population, they are the subjects of a toxic and increasingly polarised 'debate', which generates reliable controversy for newspapers and talk shows. This media frenzy conceals a simple fact: that we are having the wrong conversation, a conversation in which trans people themselves are reduced to a talking point and denied a meaningful voice.
In this powerful new book, Shon Faye reclaims the idea of the 'transgender issue' to uncover the reality of what it means to be trans in a transphobic society. In doing so, she provides a compelling, wide-ranging analysis of trans lives from youth to old age, exploring work, family, housing, healthcare, the prison system, and trans participation in the LGBTQ+ and feminist communities, in contemporary Britain and beyond."
2021,
English,
Shon Faye,
UK,
