James Boylan, a college classmate of mine, and chair of the English Department at Colby, at the age of forty could no longer bear the pressure of living in the wrong body and became Jennifer Boylan. With an ample supply of good humor and equal dose of pathos, she describes what it takes to change genders even after being married and fathering two sons. She’s one of the few people to know what women talk about in public restrooms and what men don’t say in the men’s room, and to compare the ease of purchasing dungarees in the men’s department versus the insuperable challenges of buying women’s jeans. Which is all to say she supplies a credible voice for what it takes to be a woman in America even for someone not women-born. October 2005