March 2025 Additions

For the month of March the Lending Library is expanding our collection of intersex #ownvoices books. These three works of fiction by intersex authors explore being oneself in worlds not accustomed to allowing such a thing.

First we are shelving Watercolor Memories by Lianne Simon. In this YA fantasy novel, main character Anya struggles with the changes to herself and the challenges of growing up. Not only is she intersex and grappling what’s happening to her body, her past home life haunts her. Can she find a place for herself in the world?

From the back cover:

Anya paints a watercolor landscape—the cherry grove that haunts her dreams. Something happened there, but her past flows like the colors that run down her artwork. Can she trust anything she remembers?

 A year ago, Anya was a petit blonde. Now, she’s a tall and muscular redhead, playing soccer on a boys’ team. Her foster parents and her caseworker insist she see a doctor about her bodily changes and her gender issues.

 To avoid medical treatment, Anya runs away from her foster home. As the girl searches for acceptance and family the world around her shifts. She may find love. But will she ever have the peace she craves?

Next, we’re adding Just Ash by Sol Santana. In this contemporary YA, Ash learns to find his place in the world, stand up for himself, and begin to heal. With inspiration from a distant relative and help from found family, he takes control of his own life.

From the cover:

 Ashley “Ash” Bishop has always known who he is: a guy who loves soccer, has a crush on his friend Michelle, and is fascinated by the gruesome history of his hometown—Salem, Massachusetts. He’s also always known that he’s intersex, born with both male and female genitalia. But it’s never felt like a big deal until his junior year of high school, when Ash gets his first period in front of the entire boys’ soccer team. Now his friends and teachers see him differently, and his own mother thinks he should, “try being a girl.”

 As tensions mount with his parents and Ash feels more and more like an outcast, he can’t help feeling a deeper kinship with his ancestor Bridget Bishop, who was executed for witchcraft. She didn’t conform to her community’s expectations either; she was different, and her neighbors felt threatened by her. And she paid the ultimate price. Ash is haunted by her last recorded words: You will keep silent.

 Ash realizes that he needs to find a way to stand up for who he really is, or the cost of his silence might destroy his life, too.

The third book we’re adding this month is book one of the Trans Liberty Riot Brigade  by L.M. Pierce. This science fiction novel plays with dystopian themes, using a grim setting to show the resilience of the characters and the power it takes to fight back against an oppressive regime. It’s a timely and powerful exploration of identity and revolution.

From the back of the book:

Andi knows being born an intersex “Transgressor” and then choosing to stay that way can have lethal consequences. After all, surgical assignment is mandated by law. But she ain’t going to spend her life hiding from the Society, hooked on Flow, and wanking tourists just to make a few bucks. She’s a member of the Trans Liberty Riot Brigade, and underground faction of Transgressors resisting the government’s war on their illegal genitalia.

 But it’s not enough to tag their messages on shithouse walls and sniff down the next high. The government has found their headquarters, decimated their ranks, and they’re crushing the resistance. Though Andi might be nothing but a junktard, she embarks on a desperate dash to stay alive and send a call for help before they’re all killed—or worse, surgically assigned.

 Andi, together with Brigade leader Elenbar, must get beyond the communications block preventing all radio transmission, which means crossing the seaboard Wall barricading the United Free States borders. It’s designed to keep enemies out and the citizens in, but amid increasing earthquakes and deadly pursuit, Andi will discover there’s a far more dangerous secret hidden deep within the Wall itself.