Four recent books (two just out today!) are here to guide LGBTQ prospective parents of all genders and sexual identities (and their health care professionals) on the start of their parenting journeys.
I launched my Mombian Database of LGBTQ Family Books, Media, and More because I’ve seen the power that representation can have, both in my own family and with other LGBTQ families and LGBTQ youth. That’s why I’m also proud to join PFLAG in their new #ReadWithLove campaign supporting the freedom to learn for all students. Here’s a roundup of some pieces I’ve written recently on the topic, and a bit more about the campaign.
I’ve been writing a lot about kids’ books—so for a change, here are some of the best recent parenting guides, memoirs, and social science studies for and about us LGBTQ parents.
A thoughtful and practical new guide is intended to help all parents understand gender identity and expression, have healthy conversations with their children about gender, and create an affirming environment, whether their children are transgender, cisgender, nonbinary, gender expansive, or questioning.
Here’s a fun historical tidbit to brighten your day: Ann Bannon, whose 1950s and 60s novels of lesbian life have earned her the title “the Queen of Lesbian Pulp Fiction,” is not only a mom, but also a grandmother.
Two memoirs published this year by grown children of gay dads both start just a few years after the Stonewall Riots. In one, the author’s parents divorced after her dad came out; in the other, her parents stayed together for decades more. Each shows us the pervasive blight of homophobia and reminds us of the many ways that queer parents and our children have navigated what it means to be a family.
Much previous research on queer parents and our children has focused on intact queer families (mostly with gay male or lesbian parents) formed through adoption or assisted reproduction, including surrogacy. Less attention has been paid to queer families formed when one or both parents had children from a previous relationship of any kind, or had started their family as a single parent before partnering. A new book on queer stepfamilies helps to remedy that.
Part memoir and part parenting guide, the new book by diversity educator and speaker Trystan Reese manages to tell a story that is specific to his experience as a gay, transgender dad, while offering universal advice on parenting, relationships, and more.
Today is the Transgender Day of Visibility, so I’m celebrating by rounding up 25 (!) picture books with transgender and/or nonbinary characters that have been published in 2020 and 2021 alone. (I’ll also show you how to find older trans-inclusive kids’ books and ones for and about trans parents.)
Lesléa Newman may be best known to readers here as the author of Heather Has Two Mommies and other children’s books. She is also, however, an award-winning poet, and her latest volume of poetry for adults is a wise and loving look at her father in the last years of his life.
