Customer Reviews

Trans-Sister Radio: A Novel

5 star:		(38)
4 star:		(27)
3 star:		(20)
2 star:		(10)
1 star:		(6)

 

 

Trans-sister radio is a profound novel about the intricacies of gender and sexual orientation. The topics are unusual for a novel, yet Bohjalian explores them with style and grace.

Allison Banks is a typical Vermont divorcee - she lives with her daughter Carly, has dinner with her ex-husband Will, and teaches sixth grade at the local elementary school. Her life changes deeply, however, when she falls in love with a local professor, Dana. Her passion cannot be extinguished even when Dana drops a huge bombshell - he has been preparing for sexual reassignment surgery, and is travelling to Colorado to have the procedure done in just a few weeks. Allison travels with Dana and continues to love the new woman, even as they are harassed by town members.

The novel does an excellent job of portraying all of the characters in a sympathetic manner and of enabling the reader to get at the depths of the emotions. The story is told in the context of an NPR interview, and through this format the author is able to plumb the depths of each character. The ending is perhaps a bit too tidy, and distracts from the rest of the story. Despite this, the book is an incredibly compelling read and is strongly recommended.

As an avid NPR listener, I loved how Chris Bohjalian framed this exploration into the life of a transsexual woman as an interview on National Public Radio. Bohjalian joins the life of Dana as he is on the brink of moving through the magic portal of physical/social/emotional/ of change from male to female.

The Bohjalian researched well the technical, familial, and social process that confronts a transsexual. Many books, and web sites, explain the technical details of transsexuals and the surgeries that change them from the sex they were physically born to into the sex which their minds tell them they really are.

It is the interpersonal and emotional process of transsexual transition that needed a good storyteller. The author succeeded with a delightful story about a person who could be anybody's neighbor, living in a town which could be anybody's neighborhood. This is a wonderful story about what happens when that neighbor, Dana, switches from the guy next door to the gal next door.

To spice things up Dana has fallen love with Allie, one of the town's most popular elementary teachers. The story gains more depth with Will, Allie's still emotionally involved ex-husband, and their first year college age daughter, Carly.

What is most impressive about the story are the very accurate descriptions of the struggles which the characters have about Dana's changes as told from their own voices. There expereinces are believeable and very realistic.

I closely identify with the story in Trans-sister Radio. In addition to being an NPR, All Things Considered regular, I am also a transsexual woman, living in a small town, with a female lover, two daughters (one college age), an active co-parent relationship with my ex, and a professional career. I have lived many of the emotional parts of this story and testify to the accuracy of the currents represented/

Although Chris Bohjalian took some license with some of the technical details, the aim was clearly not to produce a manual for sex reassignment. The aim was to tell a story of the impact these changes make on the surrounding a transsexual. Bohjalian met the mark with this story; the lives are well represented. It is a joy to read of characters that are like that family down the street and of a story where everyone grows, survives, and more than gender rules are broken successfully.

Trans-sister Radio is about living one's truth even as one's understanding and acceptance of it may change.

Transsexuality is a journey, as are most things in life. As a married postoperative transsexual, I can directly relate to almost every situation and, definitely, to every emotion in this excellent portrayal of transsexual impact on self and others. From the pre-divorce intimacy with my ex-wife, through the loneliness, the rejection, the joy of matching body and mind, to the unexpected involvement with a man, now my husband, my life experience echoes that of Dana. My ex-wife and children's experiences have run the gamut of those experienced by Allison and her daughter. This story rings true, and the author has performed a wonderful service of education in showing that transsexuals are not deviant, perverted freaks. We are merely people who were handed a difficult life situation and have struggled to integrate psyches and bodies.

As have those in the book, I have had gains and losses. I mourned the losses and moved on with the joy of being whole and at peace with myself and my God.

Thank you, Chris Bohjalian, for helping.

What would you do if the man you loved told you he wanted to be a woman? Trans-Sister Radio asks this question, and as the answer unfolds, readers will be captivated, fascinated and torn between right and wrong and your own beliefs about sex, gender and what is really important in the one whom you fall in love.

Allison Banks, divorcee and mother of 18-year-old Carly, has finally found the one. Dana Stevens, a college professor, has everything Allison has ever wished for. He's kind, sensitive and handsome. However, after a few months of blissful dating, Dana delivers the news: he is two months away from a sex change operation. What follows is a moral dilemma that rocks the tiny Vermont town in which they live. Should Allison still date Dana? As a teacher, is Allison violating the "role-model/decency" clause? Trans-Sister Radio explores these questions as well as how Dana Steven's sexuality affects those around him.

Chris Bohjalian has written another winner. The writing style is wonderful and gives a birds-eye view from several characters and their thoughts about and reactions to gender dysphoria, homosexuality, and falling in love. Brilliantly told story and one that held me in rapt attention until the conclusion. A highly thought-provoking and intelligent novel.

Once again Chris Bohjalian has been able to write a compelling, disturbing and heartwarming novel - from a unique point of view - and has taken what could have become a tawdry subject and written a beautiful, intriguing novel.

Trans-sister Radio is a novel in five parts - as it is told from four points of view and it also uses excerpts of an NPR radio interview. Like the other novels by Bohjalian that I have read - this novel takes place in a small town in Vermont - which makes the topic that much more interesting . Dana Stevens, a college professor meets and falls in love with Allie - the divorced mother of Carly - who is about to leave for college. The romance is going smoothly for both Dana and Allie until he tells her that he is planning on having a sex change at the end of the summer.

This is the story of Dana and Allie's relationship - from falling in love through Dana's operation and how they handle the small mindedness of their neighbors as well as how Allie's ex-husband Will, who is still in love with Allie, and her daughter Carly deal with the situation.

To say that this is an unusual book with a unique topic is an understatement but the reader will find much to enjoy in Trans-Sister Radio. Chris allows each character to develop individually as well as through each of the other characters experiences. As we can "hear" each person's thoughts as well as see how their actions (or in-actions in some cases) effect one another.

I can't say enough about this book - I could not put it down. While the topic may seem hard to swallow - it is well worth reading, whether you would agree or disagree with Dana and Allie's choices. In a lesser author's hands this book would not amount to much, but in Chris's deft and able hands - it is a beautiful book and a fabulous read.

I read this book in follow-up to Midwives. Bohjalian's writing impressed me so much with the first book that I was interested to see how he could handle this subject. I was drawn in easily with Chapter One! The subject of transgender dysphoria was one I was faintly familiar with in my professional career, and I thought it was handled with honesty, clarity and an obviously thoroughly researched insight.

What was so novel for me in this plot was Dana's lingering attraction to a woman - a contradiction to the so often stereotyped view that transsexual males are always gay. I think the love story between Dana and Allison was the element which forced me to ponder gender roles and how much of that is forced upon us by nature vs. society. It's an interesting dilemma from a female perspective when one considers how much same-sex companionship is valued, yet crossing the boundaries into romantic love remains largely taboo. This book challenges the reader to consider all relationships from a purely individual perspective rather than one that is gender-based. In many ways it is simply the tragic love story re-told in a highly thought-provoking manner.

It's seldom you encounter a storyteller of Chris Bohjalian's skill and sensitivity. He demonstrated his talents with Midwives and The Law of Similars, and now he's done it again. This is a risky novel that takes mainstream characters (and readers) to the outer limits of human emotional and sexual experience, and the author makes it all entirely believable. These are people in difficult straits who retain (or regain) their sense of humanity. The book is by turns surprising, heart-rending, outrageous, and triumphant, but always utterly engaging. As in all of Bohjalian's novels, his charaters are people you can really feel for... quirky and unique and unforgettable. Chris Bohjalian is at the top of his form. (The cover is terrific, too!) I'm already looking forward to his next novel.

I'm not quite sure how to react to this novel, although I liked it. Mr. Bohjalian has yet again written a daring and gripping novel about people who are at once easy to relate to and difficult to fathom. Some parts of the book were painful to read (the surgery section is not for the squeamish). However, Mr. Bohjalian brings great insight to the intersection of the personal and political, and writes about a usually forbidden topic with understanding and kindness. This is not a topic I would have been interested in if Mr. Bohjalian didn't write it, but since he was the author, I enjoyed it almost as much as "Midwives" and "The Law of Similars."

After knocking one out of the park with Midwives, Bohjalian has both capitalized on his singular knack for topical story-telling, and one-upped himself. For this conventionally phallo-centric male...[the] surgery wasn't an easy subject, but Bohjalian earned the right to make me squirm. The cleverest thing about this novel is the way in which, by the end of its pretty speedy 300 pages, a whole lot of things that had seemed pretty far out to me suddenly seemed not so strange at all. .... These lovely people, whatever their plumbing, deserve some happiness, and Bohjalian is wise and kind enough to give it to them. This is a love story that's both moving and makes you think.

This book was recommended to me by a friend, who said she gained a lot of insight into my situation as a transsexual woman. I read it in record time. The five stars are not for great writing, or a great story. Rather they are for capturing so many of the fundamental feelings of a transsexual, and conveying them powerfully to me, and I hope, the wider world. And I learned about my own life, which was surprising. The book is not written by an M2FTS, and yet Mr. Bohjalian nailed so many things, I was constantly wondering who gave him the DL. Mr. Bohjalian is very brave, and very ambitious to tackle such a difficult subject. Despite whatever flaws there may be in the story and writing, the book is very important, in that the essential emotional realities of M2F transition are so simply and powerfully depicted.

One in particular - that thought that I, and I know, so many other M2F's have had - that in paradise I would be a woman, because if I were not, it would not be paradise. This thought resonated so strongly with me, I wept on reading the passage. Transsexuality is about connecting to the universe in a less complicated way, one that allows us a chance at happiness, because our lives become more authentic. As I have watched my own life emerge in the last couple of years, I have felt an awesome feeling of rightness about my relationship and place in the cosmos. This book conveys that process better than any other writing I have ever encountered.

This book is must reading for all who have any desire to understand what it feels like to change sex, and why one would ever do such an insane thing. Listen to the transgendered voices in this collection of reviews. They are all endorsing.

Thanks, Chris. You are a sweetie.