I’d still recommend it to cis people as a way to get your toes wet in the vast ocean of trans experiences.

p299-300) Amanda probably wouldn't have had completed her transition by 18 in real life, but I still feel it's important to have this story. Especially considering it's written by a trans author, the praise I've heard about it is definitely deserved. After Amanda rejects her, Bee runs out into the dance and announces to the whole school that Amanda was born Andrew. So Bee’s reaction, her attempt to let Amanda set the boundaries while also showing that she is open to learning (instead of making assumptions), is refreshing. In the afterword, the author addresses some of the decisions she made in the novel "I'm worried that you might take Amanda's story as gospel, especially since it comes from a trans woman.They take her home and her very worried dad, who has by now already heard the small town news that her secret is out, sees her dirty and injured and rushes out to kill the boyfriend. It’s that time-old tale of ‘don’t treat anyone differently, we’re all the same’, but this book really emphasises that.

I liked them a lot while reading, but reviewing this, I’m sort of thinking of them as Religious Girl, The Gay One, and The One I Don’t Even Remember, which isn’t a good sign. I really liked the way the book dealt with Amanda and Grant’s relationship and I thought the note the author ended on mostly felt realistic. My only issue with the book is that Grant felt a little two-dimensional to me; he has his own story and background, but personality-wise, he felt to me like the cookie-cutter nice guy. She also has a mentor and role model from her trans support group, which such an important thing to show in trans narratives. This book is exactly what YA is for: to break ground, to break hearts, to teach us empathy, to find the universal in the specific.In the intervening years, things haven’t been easy for Amanda – in fact things got so bad she even attempted suicide. I’m sorry, I just have to mention this one thing and it’s a bad joke but I couldn’t get it out of my mind this whole book.

But, by high school, her parents are divorced, and Amanda has been living with her mother in Atlanta where she is subject to horrible bullying. He just wants her to stay safe long enough to graduate high school and move somewhere more accepting.FWIW, and I’m a cis woman so I’m not sure it’s worth all that much, I think you explained yourself well and I understood that Amanda’s journey is but one story among many.

She struggles with whether or not she should ever disclose her history to her new friends and what that means for her identity as a whole, to be a secret many would consider shameful. We pulled up in front of the Sartoris Dinner Car, an actual converted railroad car on a cinder-block foundation.But this, this is the romance that even I ruted for, and when you crack me, the hardest of the lot when it comes to romance, you know you've done a good job. She meets up with Grant and the book closes with him sitting down to hear her story and give her a chance. It is possible that, given their ages, I didn’t hold on to the idea that they’d stay together forever.