Transatlantic is proud to announce that FALLING BACK IN LOVE WITH BEING HUMAN by Kai Cheng Thom has been longlisted for the Pat Lowther Memorial Award!
This award is inclusive of trans women and non-binary individuals who feel comfortable being recognized by a women’s prize.
The Pat Lowther Memorial Award is awarded in memory of the late Pat Lowther, whose career was cut short by her untimely death in 1975. The Pat Lowther Memorial Award carries a $2000 prize and is awarded annually in May.
The shortlist for this prize will be announced on April 18th!
About FALLING BACK IN LOVE WITH BEING HUMAN:
What happens when we imagine loving the people—and the parts of ourselves—that we do not believe are worthy of love?
A transformative collection of intimate and lyrical love letters that offer a path toward compassion, forgiveness, and self-acceptance.
Kai Cheng Thom grew up a Chinese Canadian transgender girl in a hostile world. As an activist, psychotherapist, conflict mediator, and spiritual healer, she’s always pursued the same deeply personal mission: to embrace the revolutionary belief that every human being, no matter how hateful or horrible, is intrinsically sacred.
But then Kai Cheng found herself in a crisis of faith, overwhelmed by the viciousness with which people treated one another, and barely clinging to the values and ideals she’d built her life around: justice, hope, love, and healing. Rather than succumb to despair and cynicism, she gathered all her rage and grief and took one last leap of faith: she wrote. Whether prayers or spells or poems—and whether there’s a difference—she wrote to affirm the outcasts and runaways she calls her kin. She wrote to flawed but nonetheless lovable men, to people with good intentions who harm their own, to racists and transphobes seemingly beyond saving. What emerged was a blueprint for falling back in love with being human.
Kai Cheng Thom is a writer, performance artist, and community healer. She is the author of the novel FIERCE FEMMES AND NOTORIOUS LIARS, which was chosen by Emma Watson for her online feminist book club and shortlisted for the Lambda Literary Award. Her poetry collection A PLACE CALLED NO HOMELAND was an American Library Association Stonewall Honor Book, and her essay collection, I HOPE WE CHOOSE LOVE, received a Publishing Triangle Award. She writes the advice column “Ask Kai: Advice for the Apocalypse” for Xtra.
Kai is jointly represented by Léonicka Valcius and Marilyn Biderman.
Congratulations Kai!