Books like Transgender Refugees and the Imagined South Africa — picked by fans

We can learn a lot about urban refugees from works of fiction. This short story is a tragic tale of Boniface Louis R. Kuseremane, a Rwandese prince, who finds himself in Kenya’s capital, Nairobi.

The story does well to remind us that refugees come from all backgrounds and how quickly support and wealth can disappear. Nairobi initially exists as a stop-off on route to continued comforts in Europe, but the protagonist finds himself trapped on a downward spiral as his social and material privileges slip away.

Yvonne Adhiambo Owuor is most well known for her beautifully written novels Dust and The Dragonfly Sea, but long before these, her short story Weight of Whispers won the prestigious Caine Prize for African Writing.

This book is one of the first full-length books devoted to the specific topic of urban refugees. It was published in 2001, years before the pronouncement that most refugees live in towns and cities.

The book provides an intimate and detailed account of the promises and hardships refugees face in cities–in this case, Dar es Salaam in Tanzania.

An engrossing and accessible ethnography, the book shows the way that a variety of factors–age, religion, language, memory–intersect to shape refugees’ experiences in urban space.

A rich historical account of the experiences of Afghans living in urban Pakistan from the 1970s to the post-2001 ‘War on Terror’ period, this book provides a fascinating discussion of urban informality, what it means to belong, the role of citizenship, and the engagement and absence of the state in cities.

The book utilises ethnographic observations and interviews but also valuable archival data–raising important considerations of who gets remembered, as well as underscoring that urban refugees are not a new phenomenon. 

This book is set in the small city of Ithaca in Upstate New York and provides an engaging account of people living there before and during the anti-migrant policies of Donald Trump’s Presidency.

Despite the overwhelming majority of refugees being hosted in the Global South, some do receive third-country resettlement to countries such as the United States. As Hartman’s book shows us, challenges and issues don’t stop upon resettlement, and often, resettled refugees face new obstacles.

The book is also an important reminder that while most studies of urban refugees tend to focus on mega- and other large cities like Istanbul, Bangkok, and Beirut, smaller urban areas–like Ithaca, with a population of little over 30,000–are also key sites of refuge.

“I want to be a boyfriend who is a girl.” — Pen Oliveira, protagonist and all-around badass. While this YA novel isn’t specifically about being trans, it does explore gender from the angle of a girl who dresses like a boy, hangs out with the boys, and likes girls—much to the consternation of her parents. Pen does a lot of heavy thinking about what “girl,” “boy,” “man,” and “woman” mean, whether any of these labels apply to her, and the damage that results when others saddle her with expectations according to their own definitions of those words. I love books that make me rethink my definitions of femininity and masculinity, and this novel gave me a lot to mull over for a long time. 

As a big fan of cryptids like Nessie, mermaids, and catamounts, I was all in when I saw there was a book about Mothman.

This novel-in-verse is about grief, growing into who you truly are, being confused by friendship and crushes, and of course, Mothman! Noah is a trans boy whose best friend Lewis died in a car crash, and since his passing, Noah’s begun writing letters to Mothman, a cryptid that looks like a big moth with big red glowing eyes. And maybe Mothman is answering?

I was crossing my fingers with every page and hoping with Noah that Mothman was real. This is a wonderfully warm book about queerness, feeling monstrous and misunderstood, and how beautiful we all are in our weirdness. 

I was immediately intrigued by Noah’s blog about the happily ever after for trans people. My experiences have not exactly been happy ever after. The meet cute Noah has with Devin is not technically cute but really starts their relationship off on the right foot for them.

I love that Devin was also trying to figure out eir identity and decided to use e/em pronouns. Devin’s character was so sympathetic and codependently charming that e was a great vehicle to demonstrate nonbinary questioning and pronouns many people aren’t familiar with. I felt like Devin was confiding in me about pronouns and identity, and I wanted to hear more.

You might believe that I chose this book solely based on the title.

I can’t deny finding the idea of having the cover out and actively reading it in front of the kind of people wanting to ban LGBTQ+ books is a tantalizing one. That said, the real reason I chose this book is it is a helpful guide to the LGBTQ+ community that uses inclusive language and describes the different ways people identify with copious amounts of humor and quotes from members of the community.

It has important information about a wide variety of topics that I wish were around in an easy-to-read format when I was younger. There are frank sex education discussions in this book, which is vital information to fill in the gaps in sex education in most schools. I have this one saved for when the younger members of my family are ready to start… show more.

Parrotfish is a very early and stunning YA about what it is for a pre-pubescent child to transition from a girl to a boy written by a woman who prepared for this by learning as much as possible from the experiences of a close transgender friend. Because of these efforts, the problems faced by such young people and their families are sensitively dealt with in this story of Gabe's heartwrenching journey which, at times, is also hilarious. Instructive as well as entertaining, it gently schools the reader in compassion and understanding for anyone who chooses to make such a difficult journey. This was my first in-depth view of the difficulties and yearnings of a transgender youth.

I love this book because it is so personal.

Arin Andrews tells of his journey—from his confusion to his decision to make his transition. Along the way, I was drawn by his tales of acceptance by his mother, his brother, and some very religious cousins.

The book not only taught me about transgender issues and feelings, but it is also full of heart. And it is funny at times!