Declan Brennan

Full disclosure. I have known the author for many years. We have been great friends for most of our lives and I am very honoured to have had a minor part in her amazing story. This is the very opposite of a heavy read. It doesn’t bombard you with terminology or lecture you in any way. It is just a gentle and deeply human story of one father in a loving family slowly discovering who they are, propelling both them and their family on a very difficult journey. At times it seems like an impossible situation as Phillippa is trying desperately to be true to both her family and herself at the same time. It's a story of love and frustration, of hope and perseverance, of denial and strife and ultimately of acceptance. It is not overly graphic but it is very honest - even on occasion portraying the author in a less than favourable light. Depending on how deeply you get involved, you might shed a tear at times but there is more fun than sadness in these pages. For Phillippa tackles every challenge with zest and good humour, only rarely becoming downhearted and this makes for a compelling journey for the reader as well. And in the background of Phillippa's story is the bigger story of a very traditional and conservative Ireland slowly becoming more open minded and diverse and frankly more interesting, with a nudge or two from the author along the way. I suspect that for those on their own voyage of transition, this tale will bring hope that despite all the turbulence, there is a good chance of safe harbour ahead. But if you, like me, have a conventional gender identity and you don’t have a trans person in your life, I think you will still find this a very compelling read. It will get you beyond caricature and rhetoric to get some feel for what it might be like to be trans from the inside; to feel like you were born into the wrong body. The amount that Phillppa and others like her have to endure in order to be true to themselves certainly puts the lie to this being merely a “life-style choice”. Both the author and I have been great fans of Star Trek, so it seems right to give Spock the last word: “fascinating”.