I finally delved into the reviews for The Hare, and the stars are all over the place. Readers loved it or hated it. However, I was puzzled that so many of those who hated it labeled me/the book transphobic because I include a trans character with whom the main character is briefly at odds. The trans character, Chris, is actually deeply sympathetic and wise. Readers got angry because my main character, Rose, is upset with Chris and doesn't understand her "choice" to transition. Is this transphobic? To have a character confused by why someone is trans? Aren't many of us cis people confused? And isn't it important to look at the confusion, confront it, work through it? Can we not even have characters in books who express confusion - without that confusion itself being labeled abusive? It is true that many cis-gender women struggle to understand trans-women; it doesn't mean that such women (fictional Rose and, yes, real me) don't persevere and come to a place of empathy and respect, even if a complete, experiential understanding eludes us (of course it does). Fiction is about conflict and self-actualization and resolution. We get to work out in books what's on our minds. For goodness sake, this is also a class issue. Rose is primarily resentful that Chris can afford to become who she wants to be because she has the money; Rose is trapped by poverty (like many, many trans people). One reader said I clearly didn't understand trans women. It is impossible for me to understand - to appropriate - which is why I do not write from Chris's perspective, but from Rose's. Be assured, a close friend did transition, and I spoke at length to her, and she read the section and it felt true to her. And Rose's reaction - her confusion, her curiosity, her initial snide dismissal, her horror, her reckoning and acceptance - felt true to me as a writer and a cis-gender woman.