I contend that for young people today, questioning one’s gender (whatever that means) is a fashion. It is a fact that the number of young people seeking to “transition” is higher than it’s ever been before. This should be sounding alarm bells but it seems that schools and youth groups, instead of trying to get to the truth of why this is happening are, on the advice of the transgender lobby, promoting the idea that positive affirmation is the only way to help them. I had concerns, prompted by the title, as it seemed to be misgendering. How this would translate in the rest of the book was a bit of a mystery. I was worried about the protagonist deadnaming his sibling and how this would be done.

YA novel about transgender teen Puffin defends John Boyne’s YA novel about transgender teen

As a long-term ally and supporter of trans people, and the author of a new novel that seeks to help young people embrace both their own identities and the identities of their friends, I’ve been appalled by the response of people on social media towards both my Irish Times article and a book that not a single one of them has even read, since it’s not published until Thursday.” One of the positive moments that made me tear up was when the coach came around to the house. At this stage, it’s early in the book, and Sam hadn’t cut off Jason’s hair.In his article for The Irish Times, Boyne wrote about the process of writing My Brother’s Name Is Jessica, which follows a 12-year-old boy as he learns to accept his trans sibling.

My Brother’s Name is Jessica’ by John Boyne | Peak Trans ‘My Brother’s Name is Jessica’ by John Boyne | Peak Trans

Again, having such a positive person is amazing to see. We’ve witnessed recently an American athlete being banned from competing as a woman because of the hormones she takes.

He went on “while I will happily employ any term that a person feels best defines them, whether that be transgender, non-binary or gender fluid to name but a few, I reject the notion that someone can force an unwanted term onto another.” Many have taken offence at the novel’s title – which, although written from the perspective of a confused child attached to the idea of his “brother” as a boy, can be interpreted as misgendering its trans subject. This is a story that effectively promotes the false, offensive and dangerous notion that a girl can actually be born in a male body and Boyne seems to belong to that category of people who think that those who claim to be the other sex than the one they actually are should be indulged to the fullest. (And, yes, I know they call it ‘gender’ but gender and sex are conflated in this story as they are just about everywhere else). Boyne is squarely in the trans ideologues’ camp and any trans lobbyist who thinks otherwise and calls him transphobic is just daft. Lately, Jason has been growing his hair out a bit, and it’s staring to look quite feminine. He’s been a bit distant lately, and Sam misses how close they were. Martin also criticised Boyne for “misgendering” in his original article and rebuked his assertion that “there is no safe place for people to debate” trans topics “without being branded an enemy”. “I am tired of my life and the lives of my community being put up for the debate: which bathrooms should we use? Which prisons should we be placed in? Which hospital wards? Which changing rooms? Should we be allowed to play sport?” she wrote.

My Take: “My Brother’s Name is Jessica” by John Boyne My Take: “My Brother’s Name is Jessica” by John Boyne

In an article published on April 13th in The Irish Times, titled “Why I support trans rights but reject the word ‘cis,'” Boyne wrote “it will probably make some unhappy to know that I reject the word ‘cis,’ the term given by transgender people to their nontransgender brethren. I don’t consider myself a cis man; I consider myself a man.” Although Jason is reasonably intelligent and should have been able to anticipate their reaction, he is also a typically selfish member of ‘Generation Z’ and it just doesn’t occur to him to wait until he is through his exams and being cosetted in one of those safe spaces laughingly known as a ‘university’ – and his mother ensconced at 10 Downing Street – before coming out as transgender, instead of doing so at the worst possible time for himself and everyone else. If only he’d waited, there would have been no story for John Boyne to tell and we would have been spared the excruciating final chapter where, in the tradition of all the dreariest fairy tales, we learn that everything has turned out perfectly, however far-fetched it seems. He was supported from the Hay audience by the Horrid Henry writer, Francesca Simon: “I am American and I am female and my main character is a little British boy.” The comments prompted a storm of criticism, and Murphy issued a statement in which she said: “I cannot apologise enough for being the reason for this eruption of damaging and potentially dangerous social media fire and brimstone. To witness the ramifications of my actions and the divisions it has caused is heartbreaking.”The interaction is set up to be awkward, uncomfortable, a scary experience. Of all people to come forward with transphobia and deny Jason the opportunity to participate in sport, it would make sense that it be the coach. But he doesn’t care about letters from parents, he accepts Jason as he is.

John Boyne: ‘People were criticising my book when they hadn’t John Boyne: ‘People were criticising my book when they hadn’t

There is no discussion of ‘gender’ and what it actually means. What is it about masculinity that doesn’t sit right with Jason and why? Why can’t he just be a gender non-conforming man? What does he think it means to be a woman? We’re not told. The protagonist, Sam, is a 13 year old boy whose parents both work high up in the British government. He doesn’t have a lot of friends and is teased for being dyslexic. His brother, Jason, has adored him since day dot, is the captain of the football/soccer team, is very popular, and the reason why Sam is only teased and not bullied. In response, Aoife Martin, a director of Transgender Equality Network Ireland, wrote that "cis" is merely a descriptor, like "straight" or "white". "Boyne, whether he likes it or not, is a cis man speaking from a position of cis privilege," she wrote. Because it seems the only three people who can understand Jessica’s struggle at all are her psychotherapist — whose only defining feature is that he looks like a guy in a band; her football coach — who could care less about gender, so long as the team keeps winning; and Aunt Rose. And of course, Aunt Rose is a stereotypical hippie liberal who dresses up in trash bags and takes in homeless people off the street, marries them, then divorces them, you know, the way we hippie left-wing bleeding hearts do.

In short, this book is not Jessica’s. It doesn’t belong to her. It’s about everyone else but her. And when you look at it like that, it’s not hard to see why the trans community has refused to embrace it as theirs.