Detransition, Baby

A uniquely trans take on love, motherhood, and those exes who you just can’t quit.

LONGLISTED FOR THE WOMEN’S PRIZE FOR FICTION 2021
February 2021 Book of the Month for Roxane Gay’s Book Club

‘Irresistible … Detransition, Baby is the first great trans realist novel’ – Guardian
‘A voraciously knowing, compulsively readable novel’ – Chris Kraus
‘Tremendously funny and sexy as hell’ – Juliet Jacques

Reese nearly had it all: a loving relationship with Amy, an apartment in New York, a job she didn’t hate. She’d scraped together a life previous generations of trans women could only dream of; the only thing missing was a child. Then everything fell apart and three years on Reese is still in self-destruct mode, avoiding her loneliness by sleeping with married men.

When her ex calls to ask if she wants to be a mother, Reese finds herself intrigued. After being attacked in the street, Amy de-transitioned to become Ames, changed jobs and, thinking he was infertile, started an affair with his boss Katrina. Now Katrina’s pregnant. Could the three of them form an unconventional family – and raise the baby together?

‘So good I want to scream’ – Carmen Maria Machado