3 New Memoirs of Queer Parenthood and Beyond
Three new memoirs each offer different looks at queer parenthood while giving us nuanced explorations of selves, society, family, and what we pass on to the next generation. Add them to your summer reading list.
"Gay Mormon Dad," by Chad Anderson, illustrated by Remy Burke (Graphic Mundi) is a graphic memoir that chronicles his journey from a childhood of physical and emotional abuse and strict religious practice to coming out at 32 years old and living as a proud gay dad. The narrative moves back and forth between his childhood, when he learned what is expected of a "good" Mormon, to his later life after coming out, when he is making his way as the divorced father of two young children.
This is not an emotionally easy story. Anderson suffered physical abuse from his stepfather (as did his mother) and sexual abuse from his older brother. He was told that his thoughts of liking other boys were sinful, and he feared for his family's eternal happiness if he didn't suppress those feelings. He grew up thinking he was broken, and at one point, contemplated suicide.
At the same time, however, this is a story of hope, with the alternating chronology letting us know from the start that Anderson has found self-worth and happiness. The narrative tension is not in what the outcome will be, but in how Anderson got there, and how he moved through his own trauma to become the father his sons needed. "I'd once been afraid of hurting my children by coming out," he notes. "Over time, I realized I was instead creating a world in which they'd get two happy parents."
Remy Burke's bold illustrations with heavy black lines complement and enhance the text, offering visual cues to guide the reader across the chronology, with cold blues representing the earlier years and warm reds the later ones. Text and images combine into a powerful memoir of transformation and healing.
"Ugly: A Letter to My Daughter," by Stephanie Fairyington (Pantheon): is part memoir, part cultural history, and part social commentary. "Ugly," Fairyington writes, is "a word with fangs that can kill a woman's self-esteem in one bite." In these pages, she shares the story of how she came to see herself as ugly, offering reflections and thoughtful analysis to help her daughter (and, presumably, readers and their daughters) override similar toxic messages.
Fairyington explores differences in what constitutes beauty across cultures and eras, and the impact of various influences including racial and ethnic stereotypes, disability, gender, queerness, and biological connection. But while ugliness and beauty form the throughlines here, in both literal and more figurative senses, Fairyington also looks more broadly at ideas of difference and belonging. Her examination is underpinned not only by her childhood experiences and her growing sense of self as a lesbian with gender dysphoria, but also by how she and her now-wife Sabrina formed their own family, how her own self-image played into that process, and how motherhood—specifically, her own nongestational motherhood—has sharpened her desire to unpack and challenge many of society's messages about beauty, biology, and family.
The more personal sections of the book rub shoulders with ones that delve into more academic topics like social constructionism, structuralism, queer theory, and cultural history, but each approach illuminates the other. Although her scope is wide-ranging, Fairyington keeps returning to the goal of offering her daughter a guidebook for her own developing self. "I hope you'll always see beauty where others don't and tend to it in yourself and others in your gentle way because, ultimately, it's all beautiful," she writes. "Even the things that are ugly—ugly words, ugly ideas, ugly beliefs, ugly behaviors—are necessary to the expansion of our humanity and spiritual awakening." More than just a look at beauty standards, this is a richly textured and thought-provoking read.
"Spawning Season: An Experiment in Queer Parenthood," by Joseph Osmundson (Bloomsbury) is a memoir of Lambda Literary Award finalist and microbiologist Osmundson's quest for parenthood and an evocative look at how environmental, economic, social, and biological factors all play a part in forming and sustaining families.
Osmundson had wanted to be a parent since he was a child, and even wanted to be pregnant, he writes. His concerns about climate change, his own economic precariousness, and his own ability as a parent led him to think he would never become one, however—until a lesbian friend from college asked if he would contribute sperm and co-parent the resulting child with her and her partner. But not all plans go the way one expects....
Without giving too much away, I'll note that this is not simply a tale of family creation. It is a reflection on family building, yes, but also a broader look at the interconnected systems of family, gender, race/ethnicity, and the environment; at the role and limits of biology in queer parenthood; and at what it means to nourish, nurture, hope, and grieve. Thoroughly original, thought-provoking, and entertaining, it is a highly recommended look at queer parenthood with a wide—one might say "fish-eye"—lens.
Dana Rudolph is the founder and publisher of Mombian (mombian.com), a two-time GLAAD Media Award-winning blog for LGBTQ+ parents, plus a searchable database of 2,000+ LGBTQ+ family books.