A review by christiana
Obie Is Man Enough by Schuyler Bailar

4.0

This one blew my expectations out of the water. Thoughtful and relatable Obie is so easy to root for and care about. The author's note explaining that Bailar wanted to model good cis and ally behavior as well as be realistic about the kind of hurtful things that trans kids hear was super helpful for me to read and know. I also loved that this was about all the parts of Obie's life-he is a good son, grandson, brother, friend, teammate, boyfriend, and student as well as being trans, so his life reflects that in this book. Obie is also lucky to have a great support system in place to get through the hard stuff. I hope and want this for every kid who is coming out.

This is squarely a middle school book for me, even though it's more broadly categorized as middle grade--there's some swearing as well as some tough things like slurs, deadnaming, and bullying that make this a great and important middle school read, but may be something an upper elementary kid would want to be ready for (or know about) before going into it.