My guest this week has spent a fair part of this year at the eye of a storm. Torrey Peters’ novel Detransition, Baby - a gloriously gossipy comedy of manners - was rapturously received when it was published in January, chosen for bookclubs by everyone from Oprah to Roxane Gay, and TV rights were optioned by the team behind Grey’s Anatomy. It was lauded as “the first great trans realist novel” in one review and has been called the true heir to Sex And The City. Then Torrey became the first trans woman long listed for the Women’s Prize for Fiction and - surprise surprise - the haters came for her. 

Torrey tells me about the bonkers year that’s changed her life: writing a surprise bestseller, becoming an unwitting poster girl for trans issues and how fiction became fact for her in the most unexpected way. She’s a total breath of fresh air on the pressure to pass and why society can shove its eyeliner requirements!; candid on the “bracing” experience of being on the receiving end of transphobia; and fascinating on finding a roadmap for ageing as a trans woman and learning to be a stepmom. Want to know why trans women and divorced cis women are natural allies? Listen on.

You can buy all the books mentioned in this podcast at Bookshop.org, including Detransition, Baby by Torrey Peters and the book that accompanies this podcast, The Shift: how I lost and found myself after 40 - and you can too by me!

The Shift (on life after 40) with Sam Baker is created and hosted by Sam Baker and edited by Emily Sandford. If you enjoyed this podcast, please rate/review/follow as it really does help other people find us. And let me know what you think on twitter @sambaker or instagram @theothersambaker.

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