Pageboy: A Memoir: The Instant Sunday Times Bestseller

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If I was growing up today, I would probably say I'm non-binary. I was assigned female at birth and, though I like to dress "feminine", I have never felt like a woman and resent having to be a woman with breasts, periods, and the fact that I can get pregnant. I think in so many ways I didn't know what to do. My reaction was just to sort of freeze up. And, from a certain age onward, it just became so consistent. ... I was under 19. ... It's baffling to me why anyone would want to treat anyone that way, particularly someone who is so young and in a vulnerable position and new to that world. ... It's obviously in every aspect of our society and it's really harmful. So many of us shove it away, don't talk about it, are told to just let it go, brush it off, you know? And that can be just so damaging and harmful and I think allows for individuals to keep getting away with their predatory and hurtful behavior. stars from me because narratively, it doesn’t flow as cohesively as it should when jumping from the past to the present day. It is his story to tell, and I respect Elliot immensely, but I would have rather read his experiences growing up more linear. I see a lot of others agreeing here. More editing to shuffle around these chapters would have really helped here. If this has been down, I easily could have rated it higher. In a lighter way, I also love all the celebrity stuff. I love hearing about the cast of Whip It and going to parties at Drew Barrymore's house, and having Alia Shawkat trying to set him up with somebody, and all that sort of stuff is really fun to get a little peek inside of. You get that out of a celebrity memoir every time, and it's nice that we get both that and the heavy, big-capital-G gender stuff in this one.

However, I've never felt like a male either, even in my tomboy days, so it's not something I relate to. For this reason I like to read about others' experiences who are transgender. Mel: Exactly, and it's not just me. That's the case for thousands of people. Elliot writes in the book about one of his queer possibility models, a family friend named Julia Sanderson, and the fact that I think he as a public figure and this book will serve as that for queer and trans kids and show them yeah, the book is heavy — it's got a lot of abuse and hardness in it — but it also has so much joy and so much trans possibility in it. And I think that that is just so exciting for people to be able to see, to read and to be able to connect with. If the little man does throw a wobbly on the day, then bribing him with sweets, toys or other special treats is certainly an option to consider (but we didn’t tell you that!). Probably the most surprising thing about this memoir is how well-written it is. I read a lot of memoirs, celebrity and otherwise, and many people have something to say. However, just because you have something to say does not mean you can write.I could not detect myself. I didn't transform into me - the me I knew I was - like the other boys did. I was desperate to wake up from this bad dream, my reflection making me increasingly ill. Closing my eyes I'd find the memories, the moments of euphoria, of witnessing myself, praying I'd find that again. pg. 144 Mel: Yeah, that quote comes from a section where it's a little bit before his coming out as gay in the mid-2010s and about how he's privately queer and living a very queer life, and then having to watch straight actors win awards for playing queer roles, and seeing how this industry has continued to repress his queerness, his gender, his expression, and the kind of double-sidedness of that and the hypocrisy of that. I think it's a really good way of summing up something that we talk a lot about — about queer and trans folks in entertainment, and how you watch people win an Oscar for playing gay while you yourself have to stay closeted. That's a really hard experience to go through. But I would rather remember, I’d rather the hurt than not—at least I got it love you, at least I felt your love for me.” With Juno’s massive success, Elliot became one of the world’s most beloved actors. His dreams were coming true, but the pressure to perform suffocated him. He was forced to play the part of the glossy young starlet, a role that made his skin crawl, on and off set. The career that had been an escape out of his reality and into a world of imagination was suddenly a nightmare.

There was a lot that was difficult here, I was surprised at how much. But I didn't find myself dwelling all that much on the traumas, I really enjoyed how unapologetically queer the book is and clung to that more than anything else. The thought of confronting him, setting any boundary at all, made me feel like I was going to shit blood. pg. 155Searing, deeply moving, and incredibly poignant... This isn’t simply a book on what it means to be trans, it’s about what it means to be human." —Alok Vaid-Menon Playing a character that was partially starved to death allowed me to lean in to my desire to disappear, to punish myself. ...