03609cam a2200517 4500 1349687538 TxAuBib 20240630120000.0 ||||||s2024||||||||||||||||||||||||und|u 9798887072579 B0CG5M72JX Amazon 58f55675-6440-443a-8391-0a531758cd62 OverDrive (Reserve ID) 10078575 OverDrive (Product ID) TxAuBib Bossiere, Zoë. Cactus Country [Libby] : A Boyhood Memoir. Abrams Press, 2024. homophobia. Southwest. Landscape. Arizona. teen. Tucson. teenagers. prejudice. Coming of age. trailer park. transgender. bio. Sonoran Desert. trans identity. Zoey. gender fluid. Format: OverDrive Adobe EPUB eBook, Filesize: 2311kB. Format: OverDrive Kindle Book. Format: OverDrive OverDrive Read. Biography & Autobiography. LGBTQIA+ (Nonfiction.) Sociology. Nonfiction. HTML:<b>A striking literary memoir of genderfluidity, class, masculinity, and the American Southwest that captures the author's experience coming of age in a Tucson, Arizona, trailer park.</b><br /> <br /> Newly arrived in the Sonoran Desert, eleven-year-old Zoë's world is one of giant beetles, thundering javelinas, and gnarled paloverde trees. With the family's move to Cactus Country RV Park, Zoë has been given a fresh start and a new, shorter haircut.<br /> Although Zoë doesn't have the words to express it, he experiences life as a trans boy—and in Cactus Country, others begin to see him as a boy, too. Here, Zoë spends hot days chasing shade and freight trains with an ever-rotating pack of sunburned desert kids, and nights fending off his own questions about the body underneath his baggy clothes.<br /> <br /> As Zoë enters adolescence, he must reckon with the sexism, racism, substance abuse, and violence endemic to the working class Cactus Country men he's grown close to, whose hard masculinity seems as embedded in the desert landscape as the cacti sprouting from parched earth. In response, Zoë adopts an androgynous style and new pronouns, but still cannot escape what it means to live in a gendered body, particularly when a fraught first love destabilizes their sense of self.<br /> But beauty flowers in this desert, too. Zoë persists in searching for answers that can't be found in Cactus Country, dreaming of a day they might leave the park behind to embrace whatever awaits beyond.<br /> <br /> Equal parts harsh and tender, <i>Cactus Country</i> is an invitation for readers to consider how we find our place in a world that insists on stark binaries, and a precisely rendered journey of self-determination that will resonate with anyone who's ever had to fight to be themself. Media Type: eBook. Importer Version: 2014-01-08.01 Import Date: 2024-06-30 20:00:02. https://samples.overdrive.com/?crid=58f55675-6440-443a-8391-0a531758cd62&.epub-sample.overdrive.com Excerpt (Adobe EPUB eBook) https://samples.overdrive.com/?crid=58f55675-6440-443a-8391-0a531758cd62&.epub-sample.overdrive.com Excerpt (Kindle Book) https://samples.overdrive.com/?crid=58f55675-6440-443a-8391-0a531758cd62&.epub-sample.overdrive.com Excerpt (OverDrive Read)