Alphabetical by Last Name

I would be embarrassed but why bother. We’re all in the same tacky Barnes and Noble, only embarrassed by each other. Christmas music is playing and I shoulder my way to the shelves between Biography and Historical Fiction. All of us look for the same obscure book: [Redacted] Apologizes. I’m pretty sure it’s fantasy, some cross-genre of sci fi, derivative of I’m sorry.

I always cry at redemption. Isn’t it embarrassing to want something so bad? I mean, to think that I’m grown and still open. My god, of course I couldn’t be a daughter. If I had an apology I’d stop inventing them.

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Ma’s manuscript asks, what can live beside injury? Humor? Growth? This book is not necessarily about trauma, but instead follows the continued effects of its insidious echo. Not quite memoir, the pages follow the speaker from childhood on as a non-binary disabled adoptee. In this collection, Ma maps out their survival, and discovers what can live alongside it.

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