I read the book “She’s Not There” by Jennifer Finney Boylan. This story shows how James over time realized who he was and became Jennifer. Throughout the book James has trouble coping with who he is and has trouble. He thinks of his “condition” as being a transexual. He tries to be cured by trying to find people to love him and who he can love. After meeting many different women he meets Grace and is seemingly cured for a long time until he ends up understanding who he is. Over the years he had dressed as a woman and finally decided to risk his loving relationship by coming out to Grace. After a while James becomes Jennifer and visits many doctors and support groups. She continues on her journey until she finally is able to come out to the world and her friends. Most people receive her well, and those who don’t mostly ignored her. In the end she gets the operation done to complete her transition. Jennifer’s friend Richard Russo is also along for the ride even though he did not understand the process. He wrote an afterword about Jennifer's change as he saw it. I chose this book due to how different this person's life is than mine. They live in a different place and went through a lot of different things that I never will in my life. James/Jennifer is so different than me because I have not experience changing genders. She also has some very hard things like having to risk losing her wife, Grace. Over time the changes in her relationships with her friends and relatives changes dramatically and really affects her view on life and genders. She has to experience the un-thinkable as she goes through and understands things about her new gender and start to not understand things about when she was a male. What she experienced was mentally and physically taxing and changes most what she knew. He life used to be one way and was changed quite a bit. This book gave me new insights into what people who are transgendered have to go through. It helped me understand how it happened to them and what was going through their heads as they changed. This book impacted me because of how James’ relationships with his friends, family, and associates changed quite a bit compared to when she was Jennifer. Every friendship was tested. The most impacting part was how his wife was now his sister in a way and their love for each other changed very much. Her life was also crazy and confusing which adds to the aww that you feel when reading it. Richard Russo, James and Jennifers best friend, said, “A plot, I used to remind my students, is not merely a sequence of events: "A" followed by "B" followed by "C" followed by "D." Rather, it's a series of events linked by cause and effect: "A" causes "B," which causes "C," and so on. True, a person's (or a fictional character's) destiny may be more than the sum of his choices--fate and luck play a role as well--but only scientists (and not all of them) believe that free will is a sham. People in life--and therefore in fiction--must choose, and their choices must have meaningful consequences. Otherwise, there's no story.” Written by Adam
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AuthorSTenth grade students at Decorah High School share how they're reading outside of their own experiences and how it has changed them. Categories
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November 2022
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