Earth As It Is
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- $11.99
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- $11.99
Publisher Description
“A small-town hairdresser is not quite what she seems in this . . quietly luminous tale of folksy gender-bending that’s entertaining and authentic” (Kirkus Reviews, starred review).
Texas, 1930s. Charlie Bader has come of age struggling with urges he doesn’t understand. After his new bride finds him wearing her lingerie, she leaves in disgust and Charlie tries to move on. Landing in Chicago, he soon discovers a community of cross-dressers and starts attending their secret soirees. But when the attack on Pearl Harbor draws the United States into World War II, Charlie volunteers for the army, serving as a dentist and trying once again to leave his obsession with soft clothes behind.
After the war, thanks in part to the army’s faulty record-keeping, Charlie reappears in the small town of Heaven, Indiana—as Charlene. There, Charlene opens a beauty shop where Heaven’s women safely share their stories and secrets as she shampoos, clips, curls, and combs their hair. Charlene manages to keep her story hidden and her sexual desires quiet. But when she falls in love with a female customer, she faces a moment of truth—and risk—unlike any she’s known before.
“A complex and deeply emotional novel which explores a rarely discussed aspect of gender identity in the post-war Midwest . . . captivating.” —Historical Novel Society
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Maher's debut is a satisfyingly complex character study exploring gender identity in the postwar Midwest. Charlie Bader has always been drawn to the softer textures of women's clothing a shameful secret that, when he was a young man, cost him his marriage. In 1933, Charlie leaves small-town Texas for Chicago, where, for the first time, he dares to venture out in public as a woman. He finds kinship in the Full Self Sisterhood, a secret organization of like-minded individuals some of whom live fully as women, others who dress up only recreationally. Traumatized by the horrors of World War II, Charlie returns from Europe resolved to shed his masculine identity and live full-time as a woman. As Charlene, she opens a beauty salon in the small town of Heaven, Ind., where she's welcomed with open arms. For 18 years she manages to keep her secrets hidden not just the fact of her biological sex, but also the secret love she harbors for her best friend. Maher deftly navigates Charlie/Charlene's dual identities and vividly captures a complex inner struggle, but while Heaven shows a lot of promise as a setting, the rest of its residents feel more like caricatures of small-town Midwesterners. A stronger supporting cast might have made Charlene's journey feel more vivid; still, the story is transportive.
