Activist and writer Jacob Tobia is 27, genderqueer and here to blow up the gender binary with Sissy: A Coming-of-Gender Story. It's a funny, heartbreaking and earnest account of Tobia's early and young adult life, as well as a smart and accessible entry point for readers interested in learning more about transgender experiences.
Tobia, who uses they/their/them pronouns, grew up in a relatively conservative and conventional family in Raleigh, N.C. Assigned male at birth, Tobia was a sensitive, creative and "glitter-obsessed" child who found a kind of freedom with their friend Katie, whose mother let them play dress-up and raid her makeup collection with impunity. Relentlessly bullied for their femininity, Tobia learned to suppress it--and, as a result, became profoundly depressed and even suicidal, which they note is not unusual for a trans child.
While Tobia is candid about difficult experiences like these, Sissy's tone is more entertaining and playful than it is bleak. Aided by plentiful, chatty footnotes, Tobia charts the ongoing evolution of their genderqueer identity with open-hearted vulnerability and a razor-sharp wit. If Sissy has a guiding ethos, it is truth-telling. Tobia's story is not representative of some universal transgender experience, but a testament to, and an affirmation of, the diversity of truths that queer stories contain.
While everyone has something to learn from Sissy, readers new to stories and identities like Tobia's will find this memoir an especially welcoming introduction to the quite simple but still revolutionary notion that there are more than two genders. --Hannah Calkins, writer and editor in Washington, D.C.