Ten years after her pioneering transgender memoir, She's Not There, Jennifer Finney Boylan's Stuck in the Middle with You reveals how making the transition from a man to a woman affected her wife, Deedie, and their two young sons. Boylan describes being "a father for six years, a mother for 10, and neither or both--a parental version of the schnoodle, or the cockapoo--for a time in between."
At 40, James Boylan committed to becoming Jenny; when this memoir opens 10 years later, Jenny is reflecting on what a good life she has. She loves her teaching career, she and Deedie have a strong marriage and their boys are thriving teenagers. In a seamless updating of her journey, she relates stories (often hilarious) of her parents and childhood, the acceptance of their Maine community and the strength of her nuclear family. Cavalier about their father becoming their second mother, the boys opted to call her "Maddy."
What is parenting? "Every family is a nontraditional family," Boylan suggests, alternating her autobiography with 11 illuminating and heartrending interviews with Richard Russo, Augusten Burroughs and other writers, along with an adopted adult reunited with his birth mother, a father who adopted an autistic son and others who, as they tell their stories, posit thoughtful questions to Jenny as well.
While Boylan is writing as a transgender parent, Stuck in the Middle with You is ultimately an inspiring tribute, full of endearing wisdom and humor, to unconditional family love regardless of labels and gender. --Cheryl Krocker McKeon, bookseller, Book Passage, San Francisco