August 9, 2018 In Book News & Events By Rachel Gold

Exciting September events!

Come see me in September if you're near Atlanta; Portsmouth, NH; Boston; or St. Cloud, MN! Sept. 1: AJC Decatur Book Festival "Who Even Am I?" panel, Saturday, 10:00-10:45 YA Stage — Adolescence is a time for figuring out big things, including who you are. But how do you do that when your whole world is turned upside down? Details here. Sept. 4: 3S Artspace, Portsmouth N.H. An evening with me, celebrating the new anniversary edition of Being Emily! In partnership with Seacoast Outright & RiverRun Bookstore. The event is at 6:30 p.m. and is free. Details here: http://www.3sarts.org/performances/performance/An-evening-with-author-Rachel-Gold-celebrating-her-book-%22Being-Emily%22?performanceid=3233 https://www.facebook.com/events/1668617923248774/ Sept. 7: Harvard Book Store Harvard Book Store welcomes award-winning author, marketing strategist, and public speaker Rachel Gold for a discussion of her novel, Being Emily. She will be joined in conversation by acclaimed poet, literary critic, and Harvard professor Stephanie Burt. Event starts at 7 p.m. and is free, details here: http://www.harvard.com/event/rachel_gold/ Sept. 14-15: St. Cloud, MN Catherine Lundoff & I will be reading and talking at the St. Cloud Public Library on Friday, Sept. 14: Time: 4:00 PM - 5:30 PM Location: Mississippi Community Room 106 Join award-winning Minnesota authors Rachel Gold and Catherine Lundoff for an author reading and short talk on writing queer and trans fiction. Q&A to follow. For teens and adults. Details here: https://griver.org/event/saint-cloud/author-talk-rachel-gold-and-catherine-lundoff/2018-09-14/43354 And on Saturday,

July 18, 2018 In Book News & Events By Rachel Gold

My gender presentation

Below you’ll find a PDF of the presentation “Gender in 50 Min or Less” that I delivered at the Golden Crown Literary Society annual convention in early July. I’ve also tried to list most of the papers, articles and books that I read while thinking about my gender presentation. I probably forgot some resources, so this list might expand later. At some point I hope to add my notes or a link to the video if it’s public (apologies to people who weren’t at the conference if the PDF doesn’t entirely make sense without the notes). Thanks to the Golden Crown board for inviting me to speak, and to my audience for laughing at all my jokes! The presentation Click here to download! Papers & Articles: Many papers by Dr. Charlotte Tate! She has many of her papers posted on the San Francisco State University site.  Scientific American: The New Science of Sex and Gender (This is many SciAm articles combined into a book.) “Update on the Biology of Transgender Identity” LAURA ERICKSON-SCHROTH, MD, MA, New York University, published in Journal of Gay & Lesbian Mental Health, 2013 “BECOMING GENDERED IN EUROPEAN PREHISTORY: WAS NEOLITHIC GENDER FUNDAMENTALLY DIFFERENT?” by John Robb and Oliver J. T. Harris “Gender

June 7, 2018 In Flourishing in the Margins, Queer and Trans Literature By Rachel Gold

The science behind the new Being Emily

Because I like science, I read a lot of it while updating Being Emily. This ended up with many books and studies turning into only a few sentences on the page, but hopefully they’re the right, impactful sentences. Here are some of the core concepts I heightened or added in the new edition of Being Emily: Being transgender (and gender identity in general) is influenced to some degree by genetics, hormones and hormone receptors. It’s unclear whether gender identity is also influenced by the shape of your brain or your gender identity shapes your brain. Kids learn gender early and begin to have a gender identity at young ages. Many trans girls know they’re girls at early ages both consciously and subconsciously. Trans kids who can socially transition young are not at high risk for depression and anxiety. Here’s some of the science behind that understanding: Genetics, hormones and hormone receptors Laura Erickson-Schroth, MD, MA, examined over 60 years of studies about trans people to create the “Update on the Biology of Transgender Identity” published in the Journal of Gay & Lesbian Mental Health in 2013. She found that: “Overall, genetic studies suggest a possible heritable component to aspects of gender identity…” For example,

May 15, 2018 In Book News & Events By Rachel Gold

Being Emily launch day!

The new, anniversary edition of Being Emily is now available! Later today/this week I will answer some questions (lower in this post) and talk about the process of editing Being Emily. First here's some very important ordering info: on Amazon.com you can order the new paperback edition of Being Emily, but the current kindle edition is the old, 2012 version. If you want the new BE as an ebook, please order it from Bella Books. On the Bella site, you can get the new version, which I abbreviate as 2BE, as an epub, mobi or pdf file. It will work on all the major eReaders and tablet apps. The kindle format is .mobi.  Here are the links: Paperback 2BE from Bella (supporting independent publishers!) eBook 2BE from Bella Paperback 2BE from Amazon Pro tip: If you see a black spine, it's the old edition. If it has a red spine in the promotional images (even for an ebook), it's the new edition. If you are a reviewer or a professor and you want a copy for reviewing or possibly teaching from, I have some available. Email me at beingemily [at] gmail.com and let me know your preferred format(s) and how to get them to you. Questions & Answers There

May 4, 2018 In Book News & Events By Rachel Gold

Previews from the New Being Emily

We're less than two weeks to the launch of the new edition of Being Emily! I'm super excited. I got to add about 25% more content to the original story, plus there's a whole new epilogue (set 10 years after the original story), and there's a great intro. You can pre-order the new Being Emily from the Bella Books site: eBook (DRM-free, multiple formats): https://www.bellabooks.com/product/9781594935985e/ Paperback: https://www.bellabooks.com/product/9781594935985/ You can start to preview the new content now on these sites: The Seattle Lesbian is featuring an excerpt from Stephanie Burt's introduction: http://theseattlelesbian.com/harvard-professor-introduces-classic-trans-young-adult-novel/ Lesbian.com features part of one of the new scenes between Emily & Claire: http://www.lesbian.com/classic-trans-young-adult-novel-updated-for-2018/ Epochalips has another new scene of Emily & Claire that follows from the one above: http://www.epochalips.com/2018/04/trans-girl-classic-being-emily-gets-updated/ (Don't worry, you're not reading all the new stuff ahead of time if you read those, in total I added about six full scenes and extended more.) The Bella Books blog has a post I wrote about comic book characters, including why there's more Starfire and some Warlock in the new Being Emily: http://blog.bellabooks.com/2018/04/author-rachel-gold-on-queerness-and-transness-in-comic-books.html And Lesbian News printed an article I wrote in a lovely four-page spread, photos below: If you've got questions about the new edition that you're hoping I'll answer, please leave them in the comments below or on Facebook or Twitter.

January 26, 2018 In Book News & Events By Rachel Gold

Being Emily Revised Edition out in May

If you haven't read the great interview between me and Stephanie Burt on YA Pride, go read it! Editing and rewriting parts of a book that's already published was a lot harder than I expected. I wanted to keep everything that readers have loved and add new material in a way that didn't clash with the original. This new version is over 20,000 words (about 25%) longer than the original. Some of the changes were single words. For example, the first version has the word "transsexual" 59 times. In the revised edition, it's largely been replaced with transgender and trans; it only appears 5 times. Some changes were additional paragraphs or parts of scenes that I rewrote to update and make them more clear. And I've added entirely new scenes, mostly toward the end, to enhance the existing plot. As you can see from the YA Pride piece, we kept the front cover, adding the awards seals and the news that Stephanie wrote a new intro. (She also helped immensely with the edits and is a lot of fun to work with.) We designed a new back cover and added an image of Emily. I love the idea that after six years of the book being in print,

October 20, 2017 In Flourishing in the Margins By Rachel Gold

Study expands understanding of nonbinary identities

A recent study displays the variety, diversity and wonder of gender identity among nonbinary people. As someone who struggles to describe my own sense of gender (when I have one), it’s deeply life-affirming to see other people say a lot of the same things I’ve said. Often when I’m trying to explain nonbinary genders to people, I have to start by explaining what binary means: “Woman/man, you have to pick from one of two categories, that’s the binary. Some people don’t fit neatly into those categories, they’re nonbinary.” After I say that, I often still get blank looks—because woman/man is so ingrained in our culture it doesn’t make sense to a lot of people (who fit inside that binary) that there are experiences outside of what feels to them like natural categories. When I get that blank look, I do some emotional math and try to figure out if it’s even worth having the conversation continue. The real question is: do I need to show up fully here? Seeing yourself reflected in a community signals whether or not it’s safe to show up. If there are already nonbinary people, if folks know what that means, and if the nonbinary people are being treated

October 6, 2017 In Book News & Events By Rachel Gold

Exciting October events!

QUEER YA with Second Story & Queer Voices — Oct. 8 @ 2 p.m. Second Story Reading Series, in collaboration with Queer Voices Reading Series, will host a QUEER YA event on Sunday, October 8th at 2pm at The Loft Literary Center. The event will feature readings by local LGBTQ authors, a panel discussion, and book sales by Addendum Books. Author Molly Beth Griffin (Silhouette of a Sparrow) will read from Either/Or, a young adult novel in progress, as part of a 2017 Minnesota Arts Board Artist Initiative Grant. Readers will include Rachel Gold (Nico & Tucker), dc edwards (Bright City), Brian Farrey (With Or Without You), Laura Bradley Rede (Kissing Midnight), Junauda Petrus (“Sweetness of Wild”), and David LaRochelle (Absolutely Positively Not). Ally authors Steve Brezenoff (Brooklyn Burning), Juliann Rich (Gravity), and Kirstin Cronn-Mills (Beautiful Music for Ugly Children) will then join the readers for a panel discussion and Q&A moderated by Vee Signorelli of GayYA.org. A reception and book signing will follow the program. For more info: https://www.facebook.com/events/681836998671631 Barnes & Noble Bookfair & Author Reading for National Coming Out Day — Oct. 10 @ 7 p.m. Join local authors Rachel Gold, Juliann Rich and Nancy Hedin, along with staff fromRECLAIM, to hear exciting fiction and join

September 11, 2017 In Flourishing in the Margins, LGBTQ+ Tarot and Magic By Rachel Gold

Buckle up, you’re blessed

Antidotes to the "Nashville Statement" If you missed it in the midst of the hurricanes, a bunch of fundamentalist Christians put out the “Nashville Statement” at the end of August, attacking LGBTQ people. This is nothing new, but it comes at a time when other attacks have been leveled against the LGBTQ community—and this can make it particularly scary and damaging. (If you’re not a reader of long blog posts, please scroll to the video below in the seat belt section and watch that. It will make you smile and feel wonder, joy, blessing or all three.) I was a young reporter for an LGBTQ paper in the 1990s when the ex-gay movement was strong and vocal. It frightened and confused me to see these people so adamant not only that their religion prohibited homosexuality but that they could “cure” it. This wasn’t at all my experience of religion or the Sacred. You have to go through a lot of contortions to get from a loving God who teaches compassion to the ex-gay movement. And now we’re there again, so I’m adding my voice to the loud chorus of religious and spiritual people pointing out that the “Nashville Statement” is not about religion nor

August 31, 2017 In Book News & Events By Rachel Gold

Fall Reading Events

Want to hear me read from my new book Nico & Tucker? If you’re in the Twin Cities, you have three great event options: Boneshaker Books: Queer Your Reading — Sept. 15 6 p.m. at 2002 23rd Ave S, Minneapolis, MN 55404 http://www.boneshakerbooks.com/Rachel-Gold-Catherine-Lundoff-Queer-Reading Cosplay, werewolves, chocolate and local authors! Join Rachel Gold and Catherine Lundoff for an evening of reading, book signing and shenanigans. Also chocolate and cookies! Award-winning YA author Rachel Gold will be reading from her new novel, Nico and Tucker, a very queer love story about gender, bodies, healing, and knowing who you really are. Award-winning fantasy and horror author Catherine Lundoff will be reading from her menopausal werewolf novel, Silver Moon. The Loft hosts:QUEER YA with Second Story & Queer Voices — Oct. 8 2-4 p.m., 1011 Washington Avenue South, Minneapolis, MN 55415 https://www.facebook.com/events/681836998671631/ Fantastic lineup of authors soon to be announced! Join us for readings, a lively panel and author signings. Barnes & Noble: National Coming Out Day — Oct. 10 7 p.m., 2100 Snelling Ave, St Paul, MN 55113 The Roseville B&N is hosting a National Coming Out Day benefit for Reclaim. Join me and other readers—and tell us your coming out story too! Check back for more details on the October events. I hope to see you soon!