Autobiographies, essays, graphic novels or novels, we haven’t let them go! Here are têtu·’s editorial team’s favorites in 2025
- NICOLAS’S CHOICE: Nos soirées by Allan Hollinghurst, published by Albin Michel
One does not come away unscathed from reading Nos soirées as its realism makes us intimate with the character of David Win. Born to a Burmese father and an English seamstress mother in the English countryside of the 1960s, this man studies at the prestigious Bampton School from which he emerges as an actor, having learned to play a role in a social milieu that is not his. If homosexuality is never presented as incidental in the construction of David’s identity, many other facets are explored with precision.
- NICOLAS’S CHOICE: Toutes les vies by Rebeka Warrior Stock Editions
Toutes les vies refuses propriety, the hollow posture of the grieving widow and the irreproachable helper. Its frankness tolerates no distance. Rebeka Warrior writes as she sings. Her texts are raw, unfiltered, with a disarming poetry. By telling love, illness, grief and reconstruction through spirituality, she transforms the intimate into a collective experience. It is a musical novel, embodied, fundamentally queer in both substance and form. Whether you take to it or not, it’s impossible to remain indifferent.
- NICOLAS’S CHOICE: Blanche by Maëlle Reat Glénat Editions
In the 1980s, Blanche was one of the first people to contract HIV. She was only 19 at the time. Several decades later, it’s her daughter, Maëlle Reat, who tells her story by transposing it into a graphic novel format. Thus is born Blanche, the illustrated account of an diligent nurse and mother whose life has been darkened by judgments, rejection, and the ignorance of her peers. The result is the moving portrait of a woman who never stopped fighting, paired with a welcome lesson on the ravages of HIV stigma in France.
- LAURE’S CHOICE: La Nuit Ravagée by Jean-Baptiste Del Amo Gallimard Editions
With ample and meticulously crafted prose, Jean-Baptiste Del Amo captivates with this novel that sits between coming-of-age, social chronicle, and horror tale. La Nuit Ravagée is as appealing for its style as for what it says about the 1990s, reviving its claustrophobic atmosphere. While an abandoned house reveals the fears and desires of a group of teenagers, the novel charms and chills Millennials who grew up with a Stephen King book in hand. One dreams of a film adaptation!
- DAVID’S CHOICE: Douceur de la musculation by Martin Page Le Nouvel Attila Editions
If, like many queers, you have a fraught relationship with the gym, traumatised by school PE lessons and a body image unsettled by “masc for masc,” this book is likely to do you good. In this essay, Martin Page describes how bodybuilding strengthened his confidence, autonomy and freedom, and explains how reclaiming the power of our bodies can prove a source of joy. And perhaps this year your fitness resolutions will pay off…
- TABI’S CHOICE: Bambi, une vie ordinaire by Marie-Pierre Pruvot Denoël Editions
Reading this autobiography means not feeling alone on public transport anymore. Marie-Pierre Pruvot, aka Bambi, accompanies the reader with a close and intimate voice, delivering stories of inspiration, curiosity and lessons. Reading Bambi, une vie ordinaire is to listen to this trans grandmother who tells you honest, incredible, and deeply beautiful stories.
- MAURINE’S CHOICE: Fétiche by Fétiche, published by Éditions de l’Atlante
Black-market hormones, police violence, lucrative romances, tours around the world, tragic deaths and showbiz loves; it’s with a testimonial narrative gathered by her neighbor on the floor that, at 90, Fétiche on the stage recounts her life rich in authentic and fantastical anecdotes. She, who presented the revues at the famous Paris cabaret Le Carrousel for nearly 20 years, offers us a true time capsule that honors the memory of the pioneers of trans history in France.
>> And also :
- Jouer le jeu by Fatima Daas
- Les Forces by Laura Vazquez
