The Trans Rights Readathon Results

Sometimes, even I forget that I can do something.

On Monday, the Trans Rights Readathon came to a close. I’m over the moon to report that, we raised $3,050 for Trans Lifeline, a trans-led nonprofit that provides peer support and microgrants for trans people.

30 donors, plus myself, pledged to either pay per book I read during that week or made a flat donation to my campaign. I read a total of 7 books by trans authors.

My book list (reviews in the Bookworm section):

1. The Unbalancing by RB Lemberg (fantasy)
2. Cheer Up! Love and Pompoms by Crystal Frasier and Val Wise (YA romance comic)
3. Heartwood: Non-binary Tales of Sylvan Fantasy, edited by Joamette Gil (YA fantasy comics)
4. Your Body is Not Your Body: An Anthology, edited by Alex Woodroe and Matt Blairstone (horror short stories)
5. Chef’s Kiss by TJ Alexander (contemporary romance)
6. The Death of Vivek Oji by Akwaeke Emezi (literary fiction)
7. Whipping Girl by Julia Serano (nonfiction gender/queer studies)

The Trans Rights Readathon was a decentralized campaign kicked off by author Sim Kern, and anyone could join to read books by/about trans people and donate money to trans causes. Some people did campaigns like I did, and others just used it as a challenge to themselves to read more books by trans authors. Over 2,000 people signed up to participate as readers.

Kern then sent out a wrap-up survey, which accounted for 70% of the participants. The results: more than 7,000 trans books read, more than $200,000 raised for trans orgs, and ample traction on TikTok and Instagram.

Unfortunately, publishing sales data is locked away in a proprietary system called BookScan that publishers and retailers pay big money to access, and journalists and academics are barred from access. There’s no way to see how book sales were impacted beyond anecdotes by individual trans authors noting an increase in sales.

Many readers reported filling up their to-read lists with books by trans authors to read all year round!

This campaign couldn’t have come at a better time. There are 435 anti-LGBTQ+ bills in US state legislation, and most of them target trans people directly. I dread daily to see what heinousness has come to pass. These bills are all being pushed by the same lobbying groups, wealthy people, “Christian” white supremacists, and GOP politicians nationwide.

Living in Seattle and in Washington state insulates me personally from these attacks. We have laws enforcing health insurers to cover gender-affirming care and recently passed legislation to make name changing easier in WA (still needs Governor Inslee’s signature). Another bill to protect out-of-state people coming to WA state for reproductive and gender-affirming care is being debated as I write this. You can add your support.

The two anti-trans bills failed with zero fanfare in our current WA legislation session. But that doesn’t mean we haven’t seen book ban attempts and a drag story hour attack in towns less than 30 minutes from Seattle.

I still worry about the future, especially as I seek the care I need as a trans nonbinary person (and someone with a uterus). Sometimes, I forget that I can do something. Sometimes, the hateful voices seem louder, and I feel the panic I’ve carried since childhood when I was too often surrounded by those same hateful voices.

But the Trans Rights Readathon reminded me that people care and want to do something to support trans people. Thank you to everyone who helped restore a little of my hope.

Bookworm corner 📚

Act Your Age, Eve Brown (The Brown Sisters #3) by Talia Hibbert ⭐ 4/5 stars
Genre: contemporary m/f romance

This was almost a 5-star read for me. I needed one or two more bonding moments with the characters to see how their love had blossomed. It wasn't that the last 1/3 let me down; it just didn't feel as complete as the rest of the story.

At first, Eve's seemingly carefree behavior annoyed me, but she grew on me as a character as we learned more about what she loved, not just what she felt poorly about. I enjoyed seeing two autistic characters fall in love who were very different in how their autism presented itself. (Also, the 100% reliability of looking around at your family's neuroatypical patterns and being like, oh, that's why we're like this.)

The sex scenes were scorching. When Jacob kept holding that dildo, Eve should've known right then that he was in love with her.

Aurora Blazing (Consortium Rebellion, #2) by Jessie Mihalik ⭐ 3/5 stars
Genre: sci-fi m/f romance

I really enjoyed Polaris Rising as a fun romance first and sci-fi second. However, this one had too much of the mechanisms of hacking/sysadmins/software engineering, and Bianca and Ian weren't a slow burn; they were a no burn for slightly over 50%. Perhaps, Mihalik listened to too much negative feedback from sci-fi fans after the first one, or because she's a former software engineer, she needed to take a step back from her expertise.

I laughed so much about a sysadmin being called a sysadmin in the far future.

While I appreciated Mihalik making sure that Bianca is a very different type of heroine than her sister Ada (star of the first book) and Ian a different type of super soldier than Loch, the differences felt less organic in the prose. Bianca's physical weakness was overly emphasized (and I felt like a limp doily compared to her).

Getting to know more about the siblings and their dynamics was fun, especially since there are 6 of them, and we're only getting a trilogy.

I still think the asshole dad is the villain.

A dual POV at the end of the day makes a slow-burn romance work. Because we only get to know Bianca, Ian comes off as showing little to no romantic interest. Except in the highly overused "a blink later it was gone" in having true feelings expressed across Ian's face.

This isn't to say the series isn't still fun. Book 3 is already on my shelf, so I'll be here until the end.

A Caribbean Heiress in Paris (Las Léonas #1) by Adriana Herrera ⭐ 4/5 stars
Genre: historical m/f romance

There are deeply brilliant scenes here, and the last 100 pages of A Caribbean Heiress in Paris were perfect! I just wished the rest was as even in quality.

Luz Alana and the rest of the Léonas are a bunch of fun, as is Evan's family. However, Evan's characterization was a little underdone, and there were missing moments of how he and Luz Alana fell in love.

I am looking forward to reading the next book in this series.

Chef's Kiss (Chef's Kiss #1) by TJ Alexander ⭐ 4/5 stars
Genre: contemporary f/enby romance

Simone is an unlikable heroine due to her narrow "type A" personality and the mistakes she makes when Ray comes out to her as non-binary and then further mistakes when Ray comes out to their entire workplace.

Simone shows tons of growth, and I'd argue vehemently (as a non-binary person who only uses they/them pronouns) that Simone's two-chapter struggle to get Ray's pronouns right, primarily not around Ray but around other trans people, was highly realistic. But I understand those of us who might want to avoid seeing this on the page after dealing with it daily.

There are two significant missteps in this book. First, we don't get Ray's POV, so we don't know Ray's internal conflicts about their feelings for Simone. And tied to the second part, this book is such a slow burn. Ray and Simone don't even acknowledge their mutual feelings until less than 20 pages from the end of the book; this doesn't read like a romance. It reads like a book club pick or "women's literature" (god, I hate that term) marketed as a romance. Though marketing it as a romance and Ray and Simone getting a HEA makes it less of a tale of a nice cis lady who learned about non-binary people and defended her coworker, and they all took down their shitty workplace together.

I wish my quitting an abusive workplace (some of the nonsense felt ripped directly from meetings I'd been in) was as triumphant as Ray, Simone, and the rest of their video team. I also had some (personal, all-me) feelings about Ray getting top surgery mid-book and Simone taking care of them. Since I'm reading this for the Trans Rights Readathon, I probably didn't sit with those parts in the way I might've otherwise.

📽️ Watch my review on TikTok.

Dark Needs at Night's Edge (Immortals After Dark, #4) by Kresley Cole ⭐ 4/5 stars
Genre: paranormal m/f romance

Conrad and Néomi were an excellent match for each other's powers, weaknesses, and personalities. I've appreciated how Cole's heroines continue to grow and bond with each other. Not only will it serve later plots to build "alliances," but this soft power build bonds that may be stronger than the overall Lore in-fights.

Nix remains the best. I cannot wait to figure out who else she had to visit that night.

I think Cole playing with present tense in Conrad's story when he's still "mad" with others' memories was a good swing, and the moment when his story changes to past tense is skillfully done. But I don't know if it worked for me.

Likewise, the visits to Cade, Rydstrom, and Nix doing things kind of unrelated were a swing for the world-building and future plots but felt jarring when we were very much into Conrad and Néomi's world. Even if I love Rydstrom and Cole did tie it back in.

Néomi had to be a ghost for this plot to work. I loved the teasing sexiness of it when they cannot touch (and once they can, Cole doesn't hold back on the sex), and some of this book is downright hilarious. Such as the conversation where his brother reveals Conrad as a virgin.

Going into this, I was still determining if I wanted another Wroth brother story, but this was a joy.

The Death of Vivek Oji by Akwaeke Emezi ⭐ 4/5 stars
Genre: literary fiction

The best thing about reading reviews by cis people is that this entire book is about a trans femme coming into herself, how her peers love and accept her, and then how she's finally recognized only in death by her parents. Then there are cis people saying, "a beautiful novel about a SON, I will never forget HIM." Did we read the same book?

Anyway, Emezi continues to be an incredibly skilled writer. I appreciate their fiction more than their autofiction and nonfiction. There's a clear influence from Toni Morrison's writing, and that's beautiful.

I wanted to spend more time with the Nnemdi, Osita, and the other young adults and less time with the parents' generation. The young adults each had shining characterizations and reflected different aspects of queerness and modernity in 1990s Nigeria. I wanted especially more with Juju.

Ebenezer took up too much space as he didn't work well as a red herring, and we could've figured out that Nnemdi was going to the market in full girl-mode.

Still trying to figure out the point of Vivek/Nnemdi's blackouts, except that I've read Freshwater. I also do not understand Nnemdi and Osita needing to be first cousins and why Emezi made it incest. They could've easily been step-cousins if a family angle was necessary to keep the characters in each other's orbits. I certainly would've been more touched by the final chapter with Osita and the reveal of how Nnemdi died if there wasn't incest.

I read this as part of the Trans Rights Readathon, and I knew it would be sad and about death (the only spoiler I knew), but it was perhaps too much in this moment of trans oppression.

📽️ Watch my review on TikTok.

The Dragonet Prophecy (Wings of Fire #1) by Tui T. Sutherland ⭐ 4/5 stars
Genre: middle reader fantasy

Adored this way more than I thought I would. I would've loved these books as a kid, and I was very entertained as a grownup.

I unabashedly still love dragons, and Clay is a great himbo leader coming into his own. Some of the turns in the book were clever, like the bit about Clay attacking the other eggs as a baby.

The messages were very great about found family, pacifism, meeting people where they are, and not discriminating.

Found by the Lake Monster (Monstrous Matches, #1.5) by Lillian Lark ⭐ 3/5 stars
Genre: monster m/f romance

Found by the Lake Monster is silly and sexy. It delivers on the promise of lake monster sex, and Adrian is clearly inspired by The Shape of Water. Lark dedicating it "for all the Amys out there" is queen shit. (Amy is the story’s human heroine.)

Gender Failure by Ivan Coyote and Rae Spoon ⭐ 4/5 stars
Genre: memoir

At times Ivan and Rae are very funny, painfully relatable, and a tad heartbreaking as a non-binary person starting at the same agab position. I found Rae's story more relatable, which is something I think about when considering that I also didn't come out of the butch lesbian space like Ivan. I’m deeply attracted to the idea of being retired from gender.

Heartwood: Non-binary Tales of Sylvan Fantasy, edited by Joamette Gil ⭐ 3/5 stars
Genre: YA fantasy comics

Heartwood was a hit-or-miss collection for me. Building a short story in comic format is no small challenge.

My favorites were:

Blât by chlove
Expand by Raven White
Streams of Consciousness by Mar Julia
The Beast in the Garden by Ver
Shepherd by Cori Walters
This Far by Lee Lai
The Lungs of Jeju by Sunmi

📽️ Watch my review on TikTok.

The Kraken's Sacrifice (A Deal With a Demon #2) by Katee Robert ⭐ 3/5 stars
Genre: monster m/f romance

Thane and Catalina are undeveloped, and the novella feels too short for the complex nature of their relationship and Thane's early mistakes. Thane spends 50% of the book giving her an orgasm and then running away for weeks.

I did think the abortion stuff was well-handled. Because Robert is so careful about her world-building, current IRL events kept making me consider how respect for trans people, consent being taken seriously, and accessible abortions felt like more of a fantasy than having sex with a Kraken.

Luisa: Now and Then by Carole Maurel and adapted by Mariko Tamaki ⭐ 4/5 stars
Genre: LGBTQ+ fiction comics

Luisa was different from what I expected. It felt a little slow and fanciful until the ending, where older Luisa locked her younger self in her apartment, and then they got into a physical fight followed by sad hugging. Who's going to trigger you more than yourself? I'd probably brawl with my younger self too.

The art was subdued with great color pallets and fit the story’s tone. I hope Luisa finds some peace.

Save Yourself by Cameron Esposito ⭐ 3/5 stars
Genre: memoir

Cameron Esposito is someone whose work I've followed from her standup, excellent comedy show/podcast she hosted with her ex-spouse, acting work, and interview podcast Queery. This meant I was familiar with a lot of the content in her memoir because memoirs are the stories we've worked out in a way to share with the world. For Cameron, this is some form of family/friends/therapist > jokes on stage > things said in interviews/on podcast > book. Super healthy process and a way for her to share herself, especially as a celebrity.

Parts of Save Yourself are laugh-out-loud funny. As I read this, next to my partner in bed, he often gave me looks of "can you quiet your laughter?" Cameron describing the ways she was a Gay Little Kid (and how it all went over her parents' heads) was particularly charming and relatable. Mine, too, will tell you there were absolutely no signs when there were approximately 7 billion.

Cameron and I are around the same age, so I understood her references and remember the days of downloading Queer as Folk and the L Word in less than legal manners.

Cameron's writing about her relationship with her father and his long struggle to accept her queerness is heartfelt and honest in how they were emotionally estranged. And at the same time, she still called regularly and came home for holidays and college breaks. I was raised half-Catholic/half-(the bad kind) Lutheran. I've felt the same rage toward so-called Christian religions and had to reckon with being steeped in pro-colonist/imperialist white supremacy with a side of religious trauma.

I also appreciated Cameron discussing how intense her early relationships with women were and how because she didn't date women as a teen, she didn't have those maturity stepping stones, which made for messed up relationship dynamics. People, particularly in our queer generation and older, struggle with this, and I'd love to see more people talking about this. (For better or worse, this wasn't my experience, and it came with different life consequences.)

-1 star for a handful of uncritical HP references in a book published in 2020.

Cameron really nailed the ending of this memoir. It felt hopeful, too, just when we all needed it.

The Unbalancing by R.B. Lemberg ⭐ 4/5 stars
Genre: fantasy

The first book for my Trans Rights Readathon reads.

Lemberg's background in poetry shines here. It did take about 50 pages before I really got into the story and understood the world and the stakes. (I have not read their other Birdverse stories.) I loved the messages about community and what it means for people to work together even in failure. Particularly the ideas of leadership and who's suited for what tasks and how, even if you have the power, it's still all choices.

The ideas around gender and nonbinary/trans identities were interesting, and it was fun to see Lemberg play with them and expand on themes already in our communities. The Unbalancing felt specifically written for trans people, which is always a special feeling to be the target audience.

📽️ Watch my review on TikTok.

Whipping Girl: A Transsexual Woman on Sexism and the Scapegoating of Femininity by Julia Serano ⭐ 4/5 stars
Genre: nonfiction gender/queer/trans studies

Whipping Girl remains an essential and foundational text for gender/queer/trans studies, even though some of it is outdated, as it was published in 2007.

There have been improvements in access to trans care that Serano proposes for all trans healthcare, like the much-needed informed consent model for starting HRT and the creation of WPATH standards. We still have room for vast improvements, and we're currently fighting against major backsteps, especially for minors and people under 21.

In Serano's new introduction to the second edition, she discusses her reasons for not doing a full-text update (I don't blame her, plus she's written a ton since this book) and points out some of her biggest short-comings in this book, such as her privilege as a white person being largely unaddressed.

The first half of this book provides a great history and foundation for what's happened to trans rights, especially for trans women but for all of us, in the last almost 20 years. The second half was weaker, not because Serano is wrong about how trans women are targeted and how misogyny is used against them in specific ways, but because the essays were less developed. Some had frustrating gaps or in-text contradictions. (I'm not talking about the clearly more casual rifts, but the more formal ones.) I have 20/20 hindsight reading this, but the worst parts of this book were the times Serano tried to predict the future of our trans and wider LGBTQ+ queer community.

Serano takes down every bit of TERF rhetoric used against trans femmes and women in this book from almost 20 years ago. This also makes Serano's current work some of the most concise takedowns because she's been doing it for so long.

As someone who is trans and non-binary but not a trans femme or woman, I was looking forward most to the second half since this is not my experience. Part of my reading this book was to learn more about the different issues affecting trans femmes and women. So that was a letdown.

Whipping Girl is incredibly important and a critical foundation text. When I bought this (at my local indie bookseller), the trans person at the store and I discussed how this book was cited by so much stuff that it was a must-read for gender/queer/trans studies and history.

Fresh book reviews on my TikTok:

Fantasy/Sci-fi

• Uprooted by Naomi Novak
• Xenocultivars: Stories of Queer Growth, edited by Isabela Oliveira and Jed Sabin

Horror

• Something is Killing the Children Vol 4 by James Tynion IV, Werther Dell'Edera, and Miquel Muerto

Literary fiction

• Go Tell It on the Mountain by James Baldwin

Memoir

• The Cooking Gene by Michael W. Twitty

Romance

• Cold-Hearted Rake (The Ravenels #1) by Lisa Kleypas
• The Dragon's Bride (A Deal With a Demon #1) by Katee Robert
• Heartstopper: Volume One by Alice Oseman
• The Love Study (The Love Study #1) by Kris Ripper
• Mistakes Were Made by Meryl Wilsner

Superhero

• Far Sector by N.K. Jemisin and Jamal Campbell
• Galaxy: The Prettiest Star by Jadzia Axelrod and Jess Taylor

Book discussions:

• February 2023 Reading Wrap-Up
• Whipping Girl by Julia Serano, Part 11 on defining what a woman is under law
• Whipping Girl by Julia Serano, Part 12 on “passing” privilege and applying this intersectionally

Trans Rights Readathon related posts:

• My kick-off post, including my reading list
• More random books on my physical TBR that are by trans authors
• Recommendations for Children’s and YA books by trans authors
• Recommendations for Nonfiction books by trans authors
• Recommendations for Fiction books by trans authors
• Final celebration of raising over $3,000! 🎉

Book silliness:

• Second birthday book haul (saved from December)

Green thumb update

If you're a Washington state voter, the Cascade Cactus and Succulent Society is trying to get one of our native WA cacti declared the official WA state cactus. (We only have 2 native cacti.)

Declaring the Pediocactus nigrispinus (basalt cactus) as our state cactus will help protect it and bring attention to WA's flora diversity. These slow-growers have been impacted by the fires in eastern WA, but scientists are still figuring out how much.

You can comment on a bill in the WA Senate to support it. (It's super easy, no need to talk to anyone!) Unfortunately, it didn’t gain enough traction this session, but it will be revisited next session.

• Water my houseplants with me.
• The hot water bath I gave some plants to combat flat (broad) mites.

Other things

[BOOKS] Tomorrow (3/31/23) is free Romance book day, and this one will focus on trans authors and trans characters. But you can find tons of incredible romance books for free!

[LGBTQ+] Tomorrow (3/31/23) is also Trans Day of Visibility! Marches and rallies in Seattle, in Portland, and in Renton, WA.

[LGBTQ+] Need some Rainbow Bingo in your life? If you’re in the Seattle area, Waterland Pride (Des Moines, WA) is putting on a fundraiser in Kent. Play some bingo and support small town pride on Saturday, April 15th.

Protect trans kids, support trans rights, and read some books!

🏳️‍⚧️📚🎉😃

Erica McGillivray