Springing from the author's "own profound discomfort with gender", this honest, meticulously researched analysis on the contemporary history of transsexuality features in-depth interviews with gender transgressors who "opened their lives, minds, hearts, and bedrooms to the gaze of strangers". Writing about both male-to-female and female-to-male transsexuals, Califia examines the lives of Christine Jorgenson, Jan Morris, Kate Bornstein, and others.