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Harry Nicholas’s first book, an autobiographical work, contains an impressive amount of interesting and considered thought in its 224 pages. At its core, the book is an eloquent narrative of his journey from one relationship to another, with transformative self-discovery in between.

But, of course, it is so much more than that, as any such tale always is. Not least because it is very clear that Harry has thought a great deal about his place in patriarchy — from when he was growing up in what he thought was girlhood, via how he’s been perceived through transition to now, existing and socialising in queer male spaces that are almost always cis-sexist and can often also be misogynistic, with transphobic microaggressions. His thoughts are well-framed and prompt consideration, for example:

Words and labels are incredibly important — I love being gay and trans and wearing those labels with pride — but they should breathe life into us rather than suck it out. We should let the light in rather than close a door on it, expanding our horizon of gayness and transness to mean whatever the hell we want them to mean. They’re ours to own.

Harry is a funny, witty writer; I laughed out loud at his comparison of conversations on Grindr with the amazing, heartbreaking “I belong to a culture” monologue from Larry Kramer’s A Normal Heart. He also covers aspects of queer history that were unfamiliar to me, including Princess Seraphina, possibly Britain’s first trans or drag appearance, at Vauxhall Pleasure Gardens in 1732; the naked young men painted by Henry Scott Tuke (1858–1929); artists such as John Minton (1917–57) and the other mid-20th century queer artists of Bedford Gardens; and an early gay trans man Lou Sullivan (1951–91), who I only knew from his frustrations around accessing gender-affirming care because he was gay. Harry supplements the book with a bibliography of recommended reading, as well as repeated shout-outs to Juno Roche and Travis Alabanza.

Obviously, I am not the primary target audience of this work — as Harry writes himself, he realised that this book didn’t exist when he needed it himself, to help him understand what it means to be a gay trans man:

What space I can take up; how I navigate sex and dating; … how I can interpret my own masculinity, femininity and campness; how I can navigate (often) hypersexualized gay spaces

But it is definitely the case there is plenty in this book that cis queer men (like me) can also benefit from. Aside from the obvious — like observations about patriarchy and cis-sexism from someone who has been perceived as female in the past and as male now — Harry is, of course, a gay man, with lived experiences that are often no different from that of cis gay men. For example, in a chapter about dating, he describes a very familiar concept of self-worth through being desired:

If nobody wanted to have sex with me, I felt like I was unattractive and therefore valueless as a person.

I think most queer men will be able to recognise that sense of seeking value and validation through the gaze and desire of other men. And, to be honest, anyone can learn from how first Covid lockdown helped interrupt his self-destructive way of handling those feelings:

I wanted to fuck and dance and hurt. But a state-enforced lockdown put an end to my man-to-man-to-man-to-man behaviour.

There are eloquent, important sections about the disappearance of queer spaces and about the lack of queer male elders and generational trauma that he describes in the context of his self-examination during lockdown, which segues nicely into the start of a new romantic relationship, with very familiar descriptions of “I was used to fucking first, friends later” that I know plenty of queer men will understand only too well.

Likewise, as well as thoroughly deserving the “chapter title of the year award” from his publisher, his “My Knight in a Shining Jockstrap” (IKR!) is also a thoughtful, sensitive description of the anxious exploration of new spaces — I remember the same feelings on my own first visit to Clone Zone on Old Compton Street — and also of both dysphoric trauma and how to breathe through a panic attack, that latter also very familiar to me.

Similarly, while some of his first experiences visiting saunas are obviously specific to being trans, others have more universal resonance. There is, however, discussion of the parlous state of trans healthcare in the UK; we cis allies should definitely be more aware of quite how dysfunctional, gatekept and cis-sexist our current processes are. (I hold out some hope, with the passage of the Gender Recognition Reform (Scotland) Bill and the Welsh Government’s support both showing support for rational, evidence-based respect for trans people’s human rights, that at least the devolved health services might be able to make some improvements there.)

There’s also, to be honest, important moments of sitting with my own discomfort as I realise I had made gut-reaction cis-sexist assumptions while reading. Being a cis-queer ally to our trans family is obviously important, especially in this time of fascist rising and hostility, with trans lives being cynically used as a wedge that threatens the LGBTQ+ community as a whole. But allyship is a journey not a destination; we always have more to learn and there is plenty we can learn from Harry here. (One of the bemusing benefits of living through the horrors of renewed fascism is that at least this 47-year-old has become accustomed to learning how to be a better human from people over 2 decades my junior.)

But there’s also beautiful moments that brought tears to my eyes, both early on and later: Harry’s first gay male sex is a lovely, “relaxed and joyful” moment, as is his description of coming out as trans to his parents. And his boyfriend — now fiancé — Liam sounds like an absolute sweetheart. The way they marked the absent Pride and Glastonbury milestones from 2020 is incredibly romantic, even before the more vulnerable and sensitive conversations Harry describes towards the end of the book. They seem like such a healthy, delightful couple — both from Harry’s writing here and from what I’ve already seen following Harry on Twitter — that it fills my jaded old heart with joy.

This is an interesting and engaging read as well as covering important topics and, most importantly, providing some much-needed representation for other gay trans men — as he quotes from Derek Jarman: “When I was young the absence of the past was a terror. That’s why I wrote autobiography”. And it’s a quick read too. Because Harry’s prose is so engaging, I finished reading less than 24 hours; I absolutely devoured this book.

I received an advance copy for free from NetGalley, on the expectation that I would provide an honest review.

An entertaining alternate history focussing on 2 characters who move to The Gay Republic of Berlin, 50 years after the lesbian and gay (sic) enclave founded by UN resolution in 1948 at the end of a slightly different World War 2.

We follow queer teens William and Gareth as they flee a UK even more homophobic than ours was — whereas in their reality, there was no Wolfenden Report leading to (partial) decriminalisation of sex between men in 1967 and all the queer big names fled to Berlin, in ours my first Pride was in 1994, the era of New Queer Cinema and the year Priscilla was released; in our reality the 1998 setting saw the launch of Will & Grace and plenty of queer films, even if they were indies we had to seek out in the specialist sections of large film and music stores, like Bishonen (美少年之恋), Fucking Åmål, Head On, The Opposite of Sex, Sitcom, Velvet Goldmine. (Yes, those are all recommendations.)

We also see a straight family with 2 sons: father Howard is a Gastarbeiter builder and Cissie is a housewife; they both grew up in conservative small-town Ohio with the definite implication that the sexual revolution didn’t happen and Middle America is still stuck in the rose-tinted 1950s that some Republicans think was idyllic for everyone, rather than just middle-class WASPs. In both cases we only really focus on 1 of the pair, with less attention given to their partners, which I found a little disappointing — I really enjoyed how William and Gareth settled into their own kinds of queerness in Berlin and would have liked to have seen more from Gareth’s perspective and more of Howard’s journey (and maybe more of Rob?), but I certainly wouldn’t’ve wanted to lose any of the time we spend with William and Cissie. (And I can’t believe it took me half the book to notice that the woman exploring the hidden community of trans outlaws is literally called Cissie!)

It took me a while for my pedantic arse to get into the excellent worldbuilding, which was definitely more about me than Barrett’s work — while I have a kneejerk dislike for “these kinds of people live over here and those live over there”, the rationale for doing so in Gay Berlin (with districts like Twinkstadt, Paw and Diesel) certainly makes sense in-world. After a moment to get used it, I also really enjoyed the increasing use of Polari, which also benefits from a very detailed glossary at the end (less obvious in an ebook until you get to it, frustratingly) and Barrett adds some interesting and well-thought-through expansions for a language still extant in their world.

As with all science fiction, the novel is a vehicle for exploring a contemporary problem through the lens of analogy; the analogy is pretty direct here and there are 2 related themes being reviewed in this regard. Despite the setting being the literal opposite of assimilationist gays, the Gay Republic polices a socially-conservative view of sexual orientation and gender, with the same kind of “respectability politics” that has plagued queer discourse for several years. In our world that has looked like a focus on blending in with the cis-hetero-patriarchy, such as equal marriage and adoption rights, and increased policing of deviance, such as “no kink at Pride”, “drag shows are indecent” and the increasingly fascist-connected transphobia so ubiquitous in British discourse. That policing of deviance is overt and explicit in Gay Berlin, with citizenship only available to same-sex-married couples; bisexuality and polyamory are both forbidden. Even the spartan accommodation offered to straight Gastarbeiter are nicer than the slums to which trans and non-binary residents are banished. I really liked that polyamory, transness and the queering of gender expression being favourably portrayed against the cryptofascist “respectability politics”.

The main story background, beyond the specifics of William and Cissie’s own arcs, was relatively straightforward but well-composed and all-in-all this was an entertaining read — and, having spent a lot of time reading alternate histories a little while back, it was great to read one that was not just queer-inclusive (as [a:SM Stirling|14002]’s Emberverse was) but queer-centred. I’ll have to keep an eye out for more of Barrett’s work.