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A review by courtreadsney
Transitions: A Mother's Journey by Élodie Durand
emotional
hopeful
informative
reflective
fast-paced
4.5
Special note of acknowledgement to the translator, Evan McGorray, a trans non-binary person that translated this graphic novel that was first published in French to English. Without them it wouldn't be possible for more people to read this story.
This graphic novel gave me such conflicted feelings as I'm sure it will many within the queer community. I often found myself so very frustrated with the mother for not having immediate acceptance and understanding. For causing her son pain for just existing as he feels is right for him. Yet I also think it shows a very real and honest journey of a mother and both her battle with her internal bias and bigotry and the love for her child. I personally love that this work was done in collaboration with not only the mom but with her son who transitioned, "Alex" in the graphic novel.
I think the illustration style does a great job of being simplistic yet expressive in telling this mother's story. I think this story also does a great job of highlighting queer and more specifically trans history from around the world so as to inform throughout this story. This is a journey for the mother as well as for the reader. I also love how it showed that this concept is not something so confusing and scary for kids to understand. Adults push their own feelings of uncomfortability and assume their children, because younger, must be that much more confused. However in reality without preconceived biases these realities are much easier for children to accept as just another way of existing. It really shows the societal influence of gender and for people to conform to the gender binary versus some "natural" thing we know.
I also loved the ending message this story isn't really over. Deconstruction is never finished and we must continue to improve ourselves and learn. Also pointing to so many resources and additional works for learning more about trans and non-binary people, gender identity, gender expression, etc. you can tell this list was not just an afterthought. It has podcasts to memoirs to graphic novels and makes me eager to read more of these stories.
This graphic novel gave me such conflicted feelings as I'm sure it will many within the queer community. I often found myself so very frustrated with the mother for not having immediate acceptance and understanding. For causing her son pain for just existing as he feels is right for him. Yet I also think it shows a very real and honest journey of a mother and both her battle with her internal bias and bigotry and the love for her child. I personally love that this work was done in collaboration with not only the mom but with her son who transitioned, "Alex" in the graphic novel.
I think the illustration style does a great job of being simplistic yet expressive in telling this mother's story. I think this story also does a great job of highlighting queer and more specifically trans history from around the world so as to inform throughout this story. This is a journey for the mother as well as for the reader. I also love how it showed that this concept is not something so confusing and scary for kids to understand. Adults push their own feelings of uncomfortability and assume their children, because younger, must be that much more confused. However in reality without preconceived biases these realities are much easier for children to accept as just another way of existing. It really shows the societal influence of gender and for people to conform to the gender binary versus some "natural" thing we know.
I also loved the ending message this story isn't really over. Deconstruction is never finished and we must continue to improve ourselves and learn. Also pointing to so many resources and additional works for learning more about trans and non-binary people, gender identity, gender expression, etc. you can tell this list was not just an afterthought. It has podcasts to memoirs to graphic novels and makes me eager to read more of these stories.