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The Masker
After a party on the Las Vegas Strip, a young sissy must choose between her internet fantasy of forced feminization at the hands of a mysterious handsome man, or the difficult reality of transition with the help of a sisterly transsexual woman.
From Torrey Peters comes a dark new Novella about online sissy culture, forced-femme erotica, female-masking, internalized transmisogyny, and crossdressing.
From Torrey Peters comes a dark new Novella about online sissy culture, forced-femme erotica, female-masking, internalized transmisogyny, and crossdressing.
72 pages, Paperback
First published May 9, 2016
6 people are currently reading
1558 people want to read
About the author
Torrey Peters
10 books1,853 followersTorrey Peters is the author of the novel Detransition, Baby, published by One World/Random House, which was longlisted for the Women’s Prize for Fiction. She is also the authors of the novellas Infect Your Friends and Loved Ones and The Masker. She has an MFA from the University of Iowa and a Masters in Comparative Literature from Dartmouth. Torrey rides a pink motorcycle and splits her time between Brooklyn and an off-grid cabin in Vermont.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 88 reviews
May 23, 2025
One of the first texts Torrey Peters (of Detransition, Baby fame) has published, now also part of her collection Stag Dance.
This is a daring story that refuses to adhere to any sense of political correctness and rather does a complex psychological deep dive: Our young narrator is a cross dresser who meets a 60-ish transmedicalist trans woman in Las Vegas. The latter, Sally, mistakes the narrator for an early transition trans woman aspiring to a medical transition, and agitates against a married Latino whose fetish is wearing a silicone female bodysuit – but the narrator longs to be the Latino’s submissive lover.
The story ponders the binary within the trans community, how genderqueer people are judged within this community and whether gender role play reflects internalized misogyny. Aesthetically not Peter’s best text, but the way she illuminates these themes is unique and fascinating. Also, thank you to ContraPoints for making me aware of the whole truscum debate.
This is a daring story that refuses to adhere to any sense of political correctness and rather does a complex psychological deep dive: Our young narrator is a cross dresser who meets a 60-ish transmedicalist trans woman in Las Vegas. The latter, Sally, mistakes the narrator for an early transition trans woman aspiring to a medical transition, and agitates against a married Latino whose fetish is wearing a silicone female bodysuit – but the narrator longs to be the Latino’s submissive lover.
The story ponders the binary within the trans community, how genderqueer people are judged within this community and whether gender role play reflects internalized misogyny. Aesthetically not Peter’s best text, but the way she illuminates these themes is unique and fascinating. Also, thank you to ContraPoints for making me aware of the whole truscum debate.
October 4, 2016
In case the cover doesn't give it away. The Masker is an unusual addition to the shelves of transgender erotica. It is a dark, smart sort of literature that reminds me of Mykola Dementiuk.
Torrey Peters has written a story about the intersection of fantasy and reality. It is a story that takes an honest (and often painful) look at the many sides of transgender culture, including crossdressers, sissies, forced feminization, female masking, and transsexualism. It is a story of egos, attitudes, opinions, and stereotypes that manages to expose a little darkness in all of its characters.
Ironically, it is an angry conversation between a female masker and a sissy, brought on by the scorn of a transsexual, that exposes the heart of the story. Felix (the masker) talks about the fetish side of transgender expression as a gift, a sort of super-power, that provides the same escape or stress relief as alcohol, cocaine, and physical violence do for others. More importantly, he insists his sissy be grateful for it.
"You think it means something is wrong with you, that you should be a woman. Actually, you are as you were intended to be. Every transsexual I have met has wasted their gift and picked up so many worse habits to replace it. But our gift can bring us joy.”
The story is darker than I expected, with some moments of cruelty and betrayal that saddened me, but it is also far more authentic that I expected. The Masker feels almost autobiographical, and contains a great deal of thought and philosophy in so few pages.
As reviewed by Sally at Bending the Bookshelf
Torrey Peters has written a story about the intersection of fantasy and reality. It is a story that takes an honest (and often painful) look at the many sides of transgender culture, including crossdressers, sissies, forced feminization, female masking, and transsexualism. It is a story of egos, attitudes, opinions, and stereotypes that manages to expose a little darkness in all of its characters.
Ironically, it is an angry conversation between a female masker and a sissy, brought on by the scorn of a transsexual, that exposes the heart of the story. Felix (the masker) talks about the fetish side of transgender expression as a gift, a sort of super-power, that provides the same escape or stress relief as alcohol, cocaine, and physical violence do for others. More importantly, he insists his sissy be grateful for it.
"You think it means something is wrong with you, that you should be a woman. Actually, you are as you were intended to be. Every transsexual I have met has wasted their gift and picked up so many worse habits to replace it. But our gift can bring us joy.”
The story is darker than I expected, with some moments of cruelty and betrayal that saddened me, but it is also far more authentic that I expected. The Masker feels almost autobiographical, and contains a great deal of thought and philosophy in so few pages.
As reviewed by Sally at Bending the Bookshelf
February 9, 2025
This is included at the end of Stag Dance. I almost paid $75 for a used copy when I realized this was out of print because I was halfway through Stag Dance and it’s amazing and I decided I wanted to read everything else Peters has written.
I am so glad I had some uncharacteristic restraint because after I finished Stag Dance, there was The Masker just waiting for me!
This is a creepy (but not overly scary or graphic) horror about a young person figuring out their identity and preferences when they meet an older “mentor” who is maybe not all that helpful? And there’s also a creepy but kinda sexy “masker”. It’s dark and weird, but also, familiar and very brilliant.
I am so glad I had some uncharacteristic restraint because after I finished Stag Dance, there was The Masker just waiting for me!
This is a creepy (but not overly scary or graphic) horror about a young person figuring out their identity and preferences when they meet an older “mentor” who is maybe not all that helpful? And there’s also a creepy but kinda sexy “masker”. It’s dark and weird, but also, familiar and very brilliant.
April 23, 2017
Brutal, elegant, honest, delicate, heartfelt, erotic, harrowing, and utterly mesmerizing. I am in tatters.
July 22, 2020
the first words that pop into my head to describe this book are "uncomfortably seen". the way torrey peters brought me straight back to my thought processes pre-coming out with krys' internal monologue was intensely insightful, and though the book brought back the memories of a time past, it also made me more aware and appreciative of how far i've come since the days of incessantly googling phrases like "is it possible to want to be a woman" and ending up on transphobic message boards telling me my existence is a fetish. incredibly excited to read her other novella and her new novel when it comes out!
March 12, 2021
Calling this a novella is generous. It reads like a sissy erotica subreddit post. It is basically a justification for fetishizing the female experience and an attempt to rationalize it, while suggesting that violence against women is sexually arousing.
Some relevant quotes:
"He slapped me as I had seen women slapped in movies... he could treat me as a vulnerable woman.
The thought turned me on.
His slap had been the most feminizing thing that had ever happened to me, the most pure forced feminization of my life."
"Why can’t I just let my crossdressing be a fetish?
Why does my particular fetish have to take such precedence that I change my whole life, my whole body, just to accord with it?"
"I’m obsessive with my fetishes, about certain clothes, in ways I’ve never seen in women.
I’ve never heard a girl talk about getting wet putting on a new dress."
Some relevant quotes:
"He slapped me as I had seen women slapped in movies... he could treat me as a vulnerable woman.
The thought turned me on.
His slap had been the most feminizing thing that had ever happened to me, the most pure forced feminization of my life."
"Why can’t I just let my crossdressing be a fetish?
Why does my particular fetish have to take such precedence that I change my whole life, my whole body, just to accord with it?"
"I’m obsessive with my fetishes, about certain clothes, in ways I’ve never seen in women.
I’ve never heard a girl talk about getting wet putting on a new dress."
June 26, 2024
Yeah, let's get too personal!
CW for uh, discussions of sexuality? Transphobia? Fetishistic content? Forcefemme? Slurs, for sure. Look out.
I expected this one to fuck me up when I read it, but actually nah, this kind of fucks. I think it's really the right mix of offputtingly, slickly fuckin gross and entracingly, concerningly attractive.
At first I thought it was going to be a sadness self-hatred marathon, but actually it's sort of an exploration of trans sexuality, of the whole fictionmania.com, nifty.org forcefemme/sissy/whatever phenomenon in closeted transfemmes. This is an experience that's thousands of miles away from my own, my young, busted weeaboo ass only ever choosing futanari hentai basically, but it's so known to me. I know exactly what the hell is up, and it turns out that when these A Novels aren't submerged in oblique, obscure cultural references and a deluge of unpleasantness, I really adore their bit.
"The dress is classic sissy fetish-- super-pretty boys dressed in ridiculously feminine satin outfits-- frills and bows dripping in profusion not seen on a cis woman since the fall of the Austro-Hungarian empire."
I like Krys more than James H even, she is my favourite sad egg. She posts sissy photos and such to facebook accounts, (when you could still do that) and is so hopelessly far down the "seeking men for validation" hole she has an entire fuckin sissy blog, bases her value on what sad men and uh, crrossdressers buy her.
In The Masker there are two genders: Sally, the harshly cisnormative, gatekeeping, binary sex shamer trans woman, and the Masker, Felix the filthy dirty fuck-yourself-you-are-a-hot-girl crossdressing fetishist who moonlights as an attractive young man when he's not wearing silicon women's skin. Krys sort of exists at the intersection of both, shame, gender envy and "ywnbaw" instinct bubbling together alongside real fuckin validation and enjoyment from dirty sissy stuff and forcefem fiction. An instinct to dress up pretty and femme, take photos where she can see her cock poking out from the dress.
"Maybe I don’t pass as a woman, but at least it looks like I eat their hormones." This fuckin book, it just fucks, it's kinda funny and kinda horrible and all rad. I like it way more than Infect Your Friends and Loved Ones, even.
The crux of the plot is, there's this meetup for femme-presenting people--everything from Sallys to Felixes and everyone inbetween--in a penthouse outside Las Vegas or whatever, which Krys goes to because she craves community and is disappointed in when the attendants basically turn out to be 40+. She still happens to befriend Sally though, because Sally marks her out as "a real woman", "I didn't go through everything"--Sally waves up and down her body--"to be in the same club with that kind of pervert," referring to Felix in the latex womansuit, lol.
So Krys is at once very sympathetic to Sally and sort of put off, by her background and flagrant demeanour. She finds herself grossed out by Felix's habit of wearing the woman suit, but also he is this ritzy "daddy" bishounen type with tons of money and a desire to dress up cute trans girls; if he wasn't the weird crossdressing kinkster that Krys sees in herself, he'd be the perfect accessory to her sissification adventures, right?
The fact that Krys gets slapped and nearly abandoned in the fucking nevada (WOOP THERE IT IS) desert by Felix and her only thought is "he slapped me like men slap women in movies, he saw me as a woman" is very special. Crossdressing kink man is very problematic; many such cases!! NOTHING in this goddamn book is Safe, Sane or Consensual.
So, Which Way, Western Sissy? Felix keeps showing up to local transfemme events and Sally hates him to death for it, basically taking a transmed gatekeeper stance on him. She wants Krys to phone the cops on him when the next local transfemme event is held at a *very* transphobic casino, except Krys is an allosexual fiend and reveals, while Felix is palming her crotch, this plan. After the slap-happy incident above, he demands she call the cops on Sally instead.
"The only thing you see is the most old-fashioned of girly shapes. There's a kind of safety in it too. You can't even shame me for not looking like a woman, because it's a sissy dress--calling me a faggot or a perv when I wear it is just redundant."
What's the point of it all? Well, you *can* take the way it ends as a condemnation of the crossdressing forcefemme porn, and read that Sally would have been right, but I think that's pretty reductive. What sets this apart in my eyes from a Maxine Wore Black, or a Light From Uncommon Stars or whatever, is that I never get the sense that it's anything but trans-positive. It does not cast a disapproving eye upon any of its femme-presenting cast, regardless of how engaged with transition they are or aren't. Hell, it doesn't even cast a disapproving eye upon Felix, not for his weird fetish anyway. His problem is that he's a fucking creepy manipulative misogynist, really. That he tries sexually justifying that Actually, a crossdressing fetish is just the best vice, why do people transition, it's such a waste! lmao. The most telling thing about The Masker in this respect, though, is that it's far from the least erotic thing I've ever read. Passages describing Krys' sexual escapades are written with a close intimacy and a total lack of judgement. It has detail that verges on tender: Krys hasn't or can't decide what to call her anatomy. I've never heard the term "pink fog" before, but it's like, Oh Yeah, okay. The Masker says: Fuck Yourself. You can do both, you don't have to choose. It's fascinating. I kinda dig it.
Is it weird as an asexual that this is probably the most in-tune I've been with a book in terms of engaging with its sexuality? I would actually call the spicy bits of this 'good sex scenes', more than just spice.
Again I thought this book was gonna be excruciating, but I think the whole, losing-binary-gender thing was really healthy for me, I guess. I think I had a lot more fucked up stuff woven into that than I realised. I feel healthful now, reading this, where I think it would have delivered severe psychic damage to me just a few months ago. It helps to be able to view binary genders--"woman" in particular--as constructed and heterosexual, the way The Gender Accelerationist Manifesto describes, instead of as some sacred totem not to be infringed upon. I think that conception, the hopeless grasping of binary gender for validity caused a lot of strain to me when I read these things before. I think I am reading with a combined sense of slight remove and greater understanding. Feeling so very enlightened right now!!
So I kind of loved The Masker, it's a cute little parable and it deserves a kiss. It's very healthy, which is rad. Thanks for giving away your stories for free, Torrey.
CW for uh, discussions of sexuality? Transphobia? Fetishistic content? Forcefemme? Slurs, for sure. Look out.
I expected this one to fuck me up when I read it, but actually nah, this kind of fucks. I think it's really the right mix of offputtingly, slickly fuckin gross and entracingly, concerningly attractive.
At first I thought it was going to be a sadness self-hatred marathon, but actually it's sort of an exploration of trans sexuality, of the whole fictionmania.com, nifty.org forcefemme/sissy/whatever phenomenon in closeted transfemmes. This is an experience that's thousands of miles away from my own, my young, busted weeaboo ass only ever choosing futanari hentai basically, but it's so known to me. I know exactly what the hell is up, and it turns out that when these A Novels aren't submerged in oblique, obscure cultural references and a deluge of unpleasantness, I really adore their bit.
"The dress is classic sissy fetish-- super-pretty boys dressed in ridiculously feminine satin outfits-- frills and bows dripping in profusion not seen on a cis woman since the fall of the Austro-Hungarian empire."
I like Krys more than James H even, she is my favourite sad egg. She posts sissy photos and such to facebook accounts, (when you could still do that) and is so hopelessly far down the "seeking men for validation" hole she has an entire fuckin sissy blog, bases her value on what sad men and uh, crrossdressers buy her.
In The Masker there are two genders: Sally, the harshly cisnormative, gatekeeping, binary sex shamer trans woman, and the Masker, Felix the filthy dirty fuck-yourself-you-are-a-hot-girl crossdressing fetishist who moonlights as an attractive young man when he's not wearing silicon women's skin. Krys sort of exists at the intersection of both, shame, gender envy and "ywnbaw" instinct bubbling together alongside real fuckin validation and enjoyment from dirty sissy stuff and forcefem fiction. An instinct to dress up pretty and femme, take photos where she can see her cock poking out from the dress.
"Maybe I don’t pass as a woman, but at least it looks like I eat their hormones." This fuckin book, it just fucks, it's kinda funny and kinda horrible and all rad. I like it way more than Infect Your Friends and Loved Ones, even.
The crux of the plot is, there's this meetup for femme-presenting people--everything from Sallys to Felixes and everyone inbetween--in a penthouse outside Las Vegas or whatever, which Krys goes to because she craves community and is disappointed in when the attendants basically turn out to be 40+. She still happens to befriend Sally though, because Sally marks her out as "a real woman", "I didn't go through everything"--Sally waves up and down her body--"to be in the same club with that kind of pervert," referring to Felix in the latex womansuit, lol.
So Krys is at once very sympathetic to Sally and sort of put off, by her background and flagrant demeanour. She finds herself grossed out by Felix's habit of wearing the woman suit, but also he is this ritzy "daddy" bishounen type with tons of money and a desire to dress up cute trans girls; if he wasn't the weird crossdressing kinkster that Krys sees in herself, he'd be the perfect accessory to her sissification adventures, right?
The fact that Krys gets slapped and nearly abandoned in the fucking nevada (WOOP THERE IT IS) desert by Felix and her only thought is "he slapped me like men slap women in movies, he saw me as a woman" is very special. Crossdressing kink man is very problematic; many such cases!! NOTHING in this goddamn book is Safe, Sane or Consensual.
So, Which Way, Western Sissy? Felix keeps showing up to local transfemme events and Sally hates him to death for it, basically taking a transmed gatekeeper stance on him. She wants Krys to phone the cops on him when the next local transfemme event is held at a *very* transphobic casino, except Krys is an allosexual fiend and reveals, while Felix is palming her crotch, this plan. After the slap-happy incident above, he demands she call the cops on Sally instead.
"The only thing you see is the most old-fashioned of girly shapes. There's a kind of safety in it too. You can't even shame me for not looking like a woman, because it's a sissy dress--calling me a faggot or a perv when I wear it is just redundant."
What's the point of it all? Well, you *can* take the way it ends as a condemnation of the crossdressing forcefemme porn, and read that Sally would have been right, but I think that's pretty reductive. What sets this apart in my eyes from a Maxine Wore Black, or a Light From Uncommon Stars or whatever, is that I never get the sense that it's anything but trans-positive. It does not cast a disapproving eye upon any of its femme-presenting cast, regardless of how engaged with transition they are or aren't. Hell, it doesn't even cast a disapproving eye upon Felix, not for his weird fetish anyway. His problem is that he's a fucking creepy manipulative misogynist, really. That he tries sexually justifying that Actually, a crossdressing fetish is just the best vice, why do people transition, it's such a waste! lmao. The most telling thing about The Masker in this respect, though, is that it's far from the least erotic thing I've ever read. Passages describing Krys' sexual escapades are written with a close intimacy and a total lack of judgement. It has detail that verges on tender: Krys hasn't or can't decide what to call her anatomy. I've never heard the term "pink fog" before, but it's like, Oh Yeah, okay. The Masker says: Fuck Yourself. You can do both, you don't have to choose. It's fascinating. I kinda dig it.
Is it weird as an asexual that this is probably the most in-tune I've been with a book in terms of engaging with its sexuality? I would actually call the spicy bits of this 'good sex scenes', more than just spice.
Again I thought this book was gonna be excruciating, but I think the whole, losing-binary-gender thing was really healthy for me, I guess. I think I had a lot more fucked up stuff woven into that than I realised. I feel healthful now, reading this, where I think it would have delivered severe psychic damage to me just a few months ago. It helps to be able to view binary genders--"woman" in particular--as constructed and heterosexual, the way The Gender Accelerationist Manifesto describes, instead of as some sacred totem not to be infringed upon. I think that conception, the hopeless grasping of binary gender for validity caused a lot of strain to me when I read these things before. I think I am reading with a combined sense of slight remove and greater understanding. Feeling so very enlightened right now!!
So I kind of loved The Masker, it's a cute little parable and it deserves a kiss. It's very healthy, which is rad. Thanks for giving away your stories for free, Torrey.
June 30, 2016
Despite being a really quick read, there is a lot to think about in these pages. At the book's heart, it's about a young girl stumbling through the messy process of learning who she is. Ultimately, she is given two paths, and each one comes with a guide. The character seems to be driven by desire to a great extent, but something that lurks below the surface is that the self-professed guides down each of the possible paths is significantly older, and each confidently purports to know what the main character needs, despite never spending any significant time getting to know her. And they use emotionally manipulative means to get her on their side and pit her against the other, and you realize that they are both less concerned about her than they are about themselves. It's scary, and it makes for an intense read.
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November 18, 2022Ruh roh
February 12, 2025
Something that I really appreciate about Torrey Peters is her commitment to writing about some of the most off-putting and disturbing subsections of trans and trans-adjacent experience. I think it's the reason her writing can be so provocative and divisive at times--if you read it straight on without any analysis, there's a lot of fucked up stuff here, surely the author must be fucked!
But Torrey writes with incredible nuance, sculpting her characters with deep flaws and contradictions, full of desire and shame and confusion. There's a lot to think about here despite its short length.
This novella (if you can even really stretch to call it that) made me feel very upset and sad at times; it takes a microscope to cross-dressing, forcefemme fetishization, and weird gender shit no one really wants to look at because it is deeply uncomfortable. I wouldn't recommend this to cis people really, but apparently it's part of Stag Dance so it inevitably will find a wider readership with Torrey's new mainstream popularity. I just hope that people treat it gently.
But Torrey writes with incredible nuance, sculpting her characters with deep flaws and contradictions, full of desire and shame and confusion. There's a lot to think about here despite its short length.
This novella (if you can even really stretch to call it that) made me feel very upset and sad at times; it takes a microscope to cross-dressing, forcefemme fetishization, and weird gender shit no one really wants to look at because it is deeply uncomfortable. I wouldn't recommend this to cis people really, but apparently it's part of Stag Dance so it inevitably will find a wider readership with Torrey's new mainstream popularity. I just hope that people treat it gently.
May 24, 2016
Damn. This was a whirlwind of 90s internet, sadness, and longing. I read it in one go, and wish there was more. Torrey rules, and I can't wait for whatever she writes next. If you're a sissy, or a trans lady, or someone adjacent... This will ring some bells, and make you feel awkward in some interesting ways. Read this book. It's for us.
January 12, 2020
Bruh this was terrifying
December 30, 2020
dark, brutal, and eerily erotic, torrey peters stuns with a tale that’s part fantastical realism and part gender horror. the stream of consciousness is especially provocative, showing a very precarious internal battle in krys that borders on masochistic. gritty and intense, a wild ride in a compact package. i would have loved if the narrative was expanded a bit and we got more info about krys’ life in iowa and the world beyond the vegas strip. a thrilling, quick ride of a novella that’s sure to shock and excite its readers.
January 12, 2024
I tell myself this is what I want.
The short tale of Krys, a young trans woman who encounter two opposing people (forces); a crossdresser, trans fetishizing man & an older trans woman was terrific. How it exemplifies those two characters as a decision to make, whether to fall in a sexual fantasy, or transition as who you are was hauntingly well done.
The short tale of Krys, a young trans woman who encounter two opposing people (forces); a crossdresser, trans fetishizing man & an older trans woman was terrific. How it exemplifies those two characters as a decision to make, whether to fall in a sexual fantasy, or transition as who you are was hauntingly well done.
January 11, 2021
In preparation for Peters' Detransition Baby, I thought I would read her novellas so that I could get a feel for her writing style. This slim novel deals with the internal conflict which lies deeply-seated within a young girl - wanting to be sexually objectified and subdued by a male other as a 'sissy boy' on one hand and to come to terms with her destiny; transitioning into a full-fledged woman. It almost reads like a parable of sorts since Krys, our protagonist, meets two characters who exemplify these opposing paths. Her internal struggle and the choices she makes are very thought-provoking. The backdrop of club, trans and crossdresser life are very nuanced and one can see the rifts which are present within the LGBTQ+ community, especially considering how the trans women look down on the crossdressers as being a half-cooked inferior species - highlighting internalised discrimination within minority groups which should be banding together instead of putting each other down (very relatable with regard to the gay community and society as a whole, really). Krys tries to come of age and find her true self but her will and destiny are continuously worked and reworked by those around her. The mask motif is very multilayered and can be read both on a literal and symbolic level as in reality we all wear our masks on a daily basis, always treading lightly so as to be liked by our peers. The influence of social media and the construction of an online persona is also pertinent with regard to this 'mask ' theme. Overall, this book has given me a viewpoint which to this point has been lacking - a lens into the trans community (written by a trailblazing trans authorial voice) and the hardships it takes for one to come into his/her true self. A very contemporarised bildungsroman, if anything else.
This book is available for download on the author's website: https://www.torreypeters.com/ You can either download it for free or contribute via a donation.
This book is available for download on the author's website: https://www.torreypeters.com/ You can either download it for free or contribute via a donation.
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October 14, 2016This book might seem to be incredibly modern given the setting (Los Vegas) and subject matter (crossdressing and transition) but actually feels like something of a traditional fairy tale, right down to the typesetting and use of illustrations. Peters crafts a story that is structurally quite simple, coming down to a choice the protagonist is forced to make between two paths: one which seems easy and pleasurable, and another which seems difficult and uncomfortable. Like in all fairy tales, appearances here are deceiving, and the protagonist is forced to come face to face with the cold reality of their dreams once they've lost their luster in the morning.
May 25, 2022
CW: transphobia, misogyny, cheating, fetishization, objectification, and transphobic language
This was complex, and controversial one. Although I do like the important themes that it was trying to express with this unsure gender nonconforming trans femme person, I do think that execution of it was done rather haphazardly. I really enjoyed the exploration of transness and the connection of the sissy kink as well as how it can be more harmful than useful for a trans person trying to figure if they are trans.
The one that I found rather unexpected was see more of Felix, and being in the mindset of someone who does not only objectify trans women but finds some kind of calm from dressing up femininely. Also the realism of the main character, and the other people at the party that didn’t try to defend the trans woman that knew what was going on with Felix. I wished that we had gotten more of the online aspect of kink and see how this really started for the main character along with the pondering of did they think that they were trans or was the kink still a fetish to them.
This was complex, and controversial one. Although I do like the important themes that it was trying to express with this unsure gender nonconforming trans femme person, I do think that execution of it was done rather haphazardly. I really enjoyed the exploration of transness and the connection of the sissy kink as well as how it can be more harmful than useful for a trans person trying to figure if they are trans.
The one that I found rather unexpected was see more of Felix, and being in the mindset of someone who does not only objectify trans women but finds some kind of calm from dressing up femininely. Also the realism of the main character, and the other people at the party that didn’t try to defend the trans woman that knew what was going on with Felix. I wished that we had gotten more of the online aspect of kink and see how this really started for the main character along with the pondering of did they think that they were trans or was the kink still a fetish to them.
March 24, 2023
4.5 stars!
another unique short story from Torrey Peters that had me hooked from beginning to end. the last couple of pages made me feel so viscerally icky, Torrey Peters is an incredible writer. I need a whole book about the character Sally and her backstory, and I REALLY need to stop putting off starting Detransition, Baby bc if it’s as good as IYFALO and The Masker, I’m going to be obsessed.
loved the illustrations, as well, although seeing them on my phone as a pdf didn’t do them justice
another unique short story from Torrey Peters that had me hooked from beginning to end. the last couple of pages made me feel so viscerally icky, Torrey Peters is an incredible writer. I need a whole book about the character Sally and her backstory, and I REALLY need to stop putting off starting Detransition, Baby bc if it’s as good as IYFALO and The Masker, I’m going to be obsessed.
loved the illustrations, as well, although seeing them on my phone as a pdf didn’t do them justice
November 2, 2021
Disturbing, dark and interesting, a glimpse at ways in which fear can drive one's choices and betrayals. Didn't really enjoy it, despite the clever turns of phrase, because of how sad it was: Peters's other books I've read feel more hopeful, but it was very interesting, too.
February 9, 2021
I'm a confirmed Torrey Peters stan now
March 14, 2021
Unsettling, clever, dark, philosophical.
May 6, 2024
Oh my god
July 22, 2021
I will be thinking about this one for a long time. Peters is a *gift*.
March 1, 2024
Torrey Peters the genius that you are
November 17, 2021
Kris, a recent graduate, working in a railway museum in rural Idaho, goes to a Vegas transfemme/crossdressing conference in an attempt to work out if she’s actually a transwoman, or just a male crossdresser. Kris splits her time in Vegas between two archetypical elder figures: a judgemental older transwoman who sees her bottom surgery as making her more legitimate than others, and who despises crossdressers as perverting her identity; and a married doctor who insists that crossdressers who transition are throwing away the gift of their secret, delicious release from reality, a release that only works if it is compartmentalised from their lives as men and fathers.
In her first novella, Torrey Peters’ voice emerges fully-formed; she understands how to articulate the experience of being transfeminine so well that she can completely violate the expectations of trans discourse in ways that are uncomfortable, even painful, but nevertheless land as true.
*SPOILER* Kris eventually decides she’d rather follow the crossdresser’s example and betrays the transwoman who encouraged her to transition. She makes this decision out of fear and loathing that life as a transwoman would ultimately be sad and unfulfilling, preferring instead kinky crossdressing sex and allowing her doctor lover to degrade her in the bedroom. This decision hit me hard because I once looked at transitioning the way Kris does – resisting HRT because I didn’t want to be tied permanently to a lifestyle that would leave me lonely and despised, the laughing stock of society at large. But just as I eventually rejected that view, and found joy an self-acceptance in doing so, I felt that although Kris finished the book insisting her choice not to transition was the right one, she was not convincing even herself, and would come to change her mind. *END SPOILER*
Anyway. Torrey Peters is the contemporary-realist trans author I’ve always needed, and she’s hilarious on top. Highly recommended.
In her first novella, Torrey Peters’ voice emerges fully-formed; she understands how to articulate the experience of being transfeminine so well that she can completely violate the expectations of trans discourse in ways that are uncomfortable, even painful, but nevertheless land as true.
*SPOILER* Kris eventually decides she’d rather follow the crossdresser’s example and betrays the transwoman who encouraged her to transition. She makes this decision out of fear and loathing that life as a transwoman would ultimately be sad and unfulfilling, preferring instead kinky crossdressing sex and allowing her doctor lover to degrade her in the bedroom. This decision hit me hard because I once looked at transitioning the way Kris does – resisting HRT because I didn’t want to be tied permanently to a lifestyle that would leave me lonely and despised, the laughing stock of society at large. But just as I eventually rejected that view, and found joy an self-acceptance in doing so, I felt that although Kris finished the book insisting her choice not to transition was the right one, she was not convincing even herself, and would come to change her mind. *END SPOILER*
Anyway. Torrey Peters is the contemporary-realist trans author I’ve always needed, and she’s hilarious on top. Highly recommended.
August 25, 2024
accomplishes its goal. will also use this as a space to talk about infect your friends because im lazy. but peters works better in this novella style, the social observations work when theyre styled as part of smaller anecdotes used to frame the POV rather than discursions into themselves or constantly alluded to but never detailed. I think the masker works more than infect--the titular guy works as devil figure and st. sally captures both the self-mastery and lameness of righteousness, the sin city + encircling of closets in every sense of the word, and distance peters has between her characters....its well realized. feels also less contrived to Serve A Point than to just simply let characters work. its pretty good.
infect i thought was much less successful--i think the juvenile prodding peters does about cissies and gender and social dynamics at large annoying & cynical & at times fatalist in all her usual ways, in addition to thinking that the macro scifi dystopia and its history was more interesting than the t4t breakup story at center (a thought i often have abt that whole wave of dystopia years back). I actually think detransition baby takes the elements and crafts a much more resonant picture.....one of those things in an authors bibliography that ends up feeling like a bit redundant with later work!
infect i thought was much less successful--i think the juvenile prodding peters does about cissies and gender and social dynamics at large annoying & cynical & at times fatalist in all her usual ways, in addition to thinking that the macro scifi dystopia and its history was more interesting than the t4t breakup story at center (a thought i often have abt that whole wave of dystopia years back). I actually think detransition baby takes the elements and crafts a much more resonant picture.....one of those things in an authors bibliography that ends up feeling like a bit redundant with later work!
July 12, 2021
The Odyssey might [be] the foundational text for Western culture, but forced femme erotica is the foundational text for closeted crossdressers, and I'm erotica-literate enough to know that the stories only get hot when authors don't mess up the basic narrative: when a man calls you Princess and wants to dress you up, a sissy will blush and defer to his strength. (p 41)
Among gender and sexuality minority communities, it's so so common to struggle with competing and insufficient narratives that we're somehow supposed to occupy in order to be manageable. This book is not erotica, but it is very much about identity management through erotica narratives as a way to access sexuality, which for many of us means feeling simultaneously sexy, compromised, and miserable. God, I felt so seen reading this.
March 3, 2022
This needs to be proofread. There is everything from typos, missing words, and even extra words. I don't think I have ever read something with as many issues as this, especially considering how short it is.
This novella does say some interesting things about accepting ourselves, but then it also says some very questionable things about cis women. I honestly just don't really know what to think in the end.
This novella does say some interesting things about accepting ourselves, but then it also says some very questionable things about cis women. I honestly just don't really know what to think in the end.
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