blogcutter

It was indeed a fascinating book, not so much for the trans story but the incredibly isolated (as well as gender-segregated) lifestyle the author led as a boy and a young man (at least socially) during the first two decades of her life (and she's still a young woman - we're talking 1990s and early 2000s New York State here!) She was one of 13 children, she married at 18 and sired a son and her formal education was nearly all in Hebrew and Yiddish, studying the Torah in excruciating detail but barely any of the traditional academic subjects one would expect in the modern world.

It was also a frustrating book because for me at least, it ended way too soon. All of the transgender journey is packed into the last chapter. We learn that she divorced her wife, that only two of her siblings are still communicating with her, and that she graduated from Columbia University. I really wanted more details as to how she accomplished all that and how life was for the divorced wife and the rest of the family, although I understand the author's probable need for reticence about all that.