I have friends of every gender permutation: gay, lesbian, trans, questioning. I accept gender fluidity without question, particularly when I see the psychological release that the freedom to be fully themselves brings. But I must confess that gender fluidity and trans are not concepts I truly understand. Sex typing happens so early in our development—as zygotes. How could nature get it so wrong? This book opened my eyes to the nuance and complexity of gender. In spite of my belief in my own openness, I still saw gender as black and white and not as a spectrum. After reading this book, I understand better the relief of locating yourself on the spectrum and the happiness, even joy, when others see and accept your place there.What this novel also helped me understand is how my upbringing—the descendant of a tough, unyielding German Lutheran farm family--ground and polished the lenses through which I see the world.This is a novel of gender fluidity, but also of the damage caused by abusive parenting. I realized as I read that I also am guilty of black and white thinking where child abuse is concerned. I associate child abuse with prosecutable crimes—the parent who sexually assaults a child or breaks bones. The welts from a belt that happen just rarely enough and don’t leave lasting scars, so child protective services might be considered but not called, is an uncomfortable place on the child abuse spectrum. The parent who is sarcastic and dismissive, who withholds love and clearly favors a sibling, does lasting and often unrecognized damage. This book starts out as a memoir, loosely disguised as a novel. The author is unflinching as she dissects her childhood and demands that her place on the spectrum of child abuse be acknowledged. As her protagonist reaches adulthood, it is truly revelatory to see the protagonist turning into her mother in ways she herself may not fully understand.The second half of the book is harrowing, as she almost drives away the chance for a transforming love. But her willingness to look deeply at herself, to understand where the scar tissue of her own rearing has stiffened and closed her off to life’s possibilities, is ultimately redemptive. You can try to type this book as memoir or romance, but if you accept it as being on the spectrum of many genres, then you realize what you have is an eye opening and important addition to conversations on childhood traumas and gender fluidity. I believe everyone should read this, from the person who believes gender free bathrooms are a sign of the apocalypse, to the person (like me) who believes that (s)he accepts everyone but still has a level of barely acknowledged discomfort with gender fluidity, to the person who hasn’t found or acknowledged their place on the spectra of traumatic childhood or gender yet and feels the rootlessness of being alone with their secret. As a former public librarian who purchased books for libraries and selected the first online magazines for gay teenagers in Georgia, I would snap this book up for any public library collection. Besides being an important addition to the conversations on child abuse and gender, it’s a really good read. I finished it in a night. It has been a while since a book made me read into the early hours.