Reviews

Gender Queer by Maia Kobabe

nick1805's review against another edition

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emotional informative inspiring reflective medium-paced

4.75

marlfox24's review against another edition

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challenging emotional funny hopeful informative inspiring reflective sad tense fast-paced

5.0

nico8themoon's review against another edition

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emotional informative inspiring reflective fast-paced

3.75

ejknapp's review against another edition

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emotional funny hopeful informative inspiring reflective fast-paced

3.5

jake_caldwell51's review against another edition

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emotional hopeful informative inspiring sad medium-paced

5.0

ashley_mrose530's review against another edition

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emotional hopeful informative reflective fast-paced

4.25

I really enjoyed the art style of this one. It was simple and concise even though the content was deep, emotional, and sometimes difficult to read. I applaud the author for writing about eir experiences of being nonbinary in a forced binary world. It couldn't have been easy to relive some of these things while writing and drawing them. 
I really appreciated the look into an experience much different from my own to see how much nonbinary people have to go through and try to see my own misgivings and ways I could try to help make things easier.
The main criticism I have is that this jumped around quite a bit and some of the things I didn't think were entirely necessary. I know memoirs are difficult and sometimes don't work chronologically but I do prefer them to be as chronological as possible and I think this one was better than some others I've read but it still felt a little choppy to me and unorganized. I also felt like some things were brought up but didn't really have anything to do with the overall story. Like the snakes thing was brought up but then never mentioned again. I don't know if it was included just to give personality and show how "tomboy"-ish the author was or what. If that was the case, I feel like it could have been incorporated a little bit better rather than just randomly inserting it in the beginning with no connection to anything else.
Besides that, this was a really good graphic novel and I would definitely recommend it to anyone who wants to be a better ally to the trans and nonbinary community. 

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siavoosh's review against another edition

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4.0

This gorgeous graphic novel is Maia Kobabe's tale of how e came to get to figure out eir identity, step by step from childhood, in a world that dismissed it entirely. It has a great portrayal of confusion, questioning, dysphoria and anxiety. It captures experiences that are universal in the queer community, as well as ones that are unique to the author emself. As a genderqueer person, I saw a lot of my own journey reflected here, though mine was way shorter and less painful, thanks to the internet and good friends. And a lot of what e went through was new to me in many ways, and I found myself eager to learn more about em and eir experiences.
I think we need more stories like this. A lot of them. Stories about discovering and getting to accept and love yourself. Stories that acknowledge the hardships young queer people go through when they're trying to find their way to their purest self, and promise them a possible good ending.

anishaaa's review against another edition

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hopeful informative inspiring medium-paced

5.0

Gorgeous illustrations - I love Kobabe's art style.

 As a cis person, I understood nb/gnc identities on a more technical level, but Genderqueer did a great job describing the emotional side of discovering ones gender/sexual identity. Kobabe used simple, effective languages and images to portray their journey. 

I liked the references to the media Kobabe was consuming while figuring out eir identity. It is so similar to the media I consumed at the time and firmly established the setting of the story (is it still a story if it's a memoir?) It's insane how queer people independently identified and resonated with a lot of the same media at the same time! 

Book bans are stupid - any librarians shelving this in a childrens' section are too - this is firmly YA at the very least, or new adult. 

annineamundsen's review against another edition

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4.0

Very important! Could've done without the HP-references

my_queer_library's review against another edition

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emotional hopeful informative inspiring reflective fast-paced

4.0