9 Beautiful Nonfiction Books by Trans & Nonbinary Asian Authors to Read Right Now

If I had a quarter for every time I’ve shouted about this book this year, I’d have a lot of quarters. In these luminous essays, Imbler draws surprising and creative connections between the creatures that inhabit the ocean and their own life as a queer, mixed-race person. They write about immortal jellyfish, whale falls, and the organisms that inhabit deep sea vents alongside queer dance parties, Riis Beach, and trans identity. Every essay is a banger. They will make you laugh and cry and think about nature, gender, queerness, and storytelling in a thousand new ways.

This is one of my favorite essay collections. Thom is such a thoughtful and generous writer. She’s not afraid to dig into thorny questions, and she does so in a way that makes you want to settle in and grapple with them, too. She writes about art and activism in queer and trans communities, the complexities of accountability and forgiveness, and the ways that we talk — and don’t talk — about violence, harm, and abuse. It’s a powerful, honest book, and one that I think anyone involved in movement work, or in relation with others (so, everyone) should read.

Why are we so afraid of change? Why are we trained to believe that permanence is good? Why do we so equate endings with failure? Vivek Shraya delves into these questions with grace, humor, and dazzling clarity. She explores change through a variety of lenses — transition, celebrity comebacks, the end of a romantic relationship. She argues that change is a natural human state, that it’s the journey, not the destination, that makes us who we are. It’s one of the best 100 pages of nonfiction I’ve read in the last few years.

In this vulnerable memoir, Meredith Talusan writes about her childhood in the Philippines and immigration to the U.S., her years at Harvard and eventual transition, and her experience as a trans woman with albinism in the U.S. She shares so openly about the various identities she’s held throughout her life, and the different ways they’ve shaped her. It’s a complicated book that doesn’t adhere to a simple narrative, with thoughtful reflections on race, geography, gender, sexuality, education, and more.

In their work of nonfiction, author and perfumer Tanaïs uses scent as a jumping off point to explore so much: the history of South Asia, the legacies of imperialism and colonialism; beauty and creativity; violence and patriarchy; and the revolutionary lineages of storytelling and resistance that thrive across diasporas. It’s a beautiful, intimate blend of memoir and history — and it’s full of incredible descriptions of scents, scent memories, and perfumes.

This collection of poetry, which includes many prose poems, feels almost like a reading journal: it’s so direct and intimate. The poems center transition, Chinese American identity, immigration, mental health, and the many ways a person can process trauma — through art, creation, friendship, and therapy. The whole collection is a gorgeous portrait of a journey toward wholeness, and worth a read even if you’re not usually a poetry person.

Many readers first encountered Ryka Aoki through her fantastic sci-fi/fantasy novel Light From Uncommon Stars. But it’s far from the first book she’s written! She is also a poet and an essayist. In this collection of essays, reflections, poems, meditations, and transcriptions of performances, speeches, and more, Aoki writes about trans womanhood, survival, queer community, injustice, and self-discovery.