BECAUSE YOU ARE MINE

A trans person looks back on their relationship with their mother after her disappearance.

Boaz’s novel opens two weeks after George’s mother, Louise, vanished from Willow, New Mexico. In the year or so before her disappearance, George and their girlfriend, Truley, had been living with Louise in her home. Cobbling together part-time jobs, the two semi-adrift 20-somethings pursued their creative pursuits while Louise, a native New Yorker and former publishing professional, toiled away at her copyediting job at the local paper. George, Louise, and Truley often spent their nights together laughing, gossiping, and drinking wine by the fire; their home may have been happy, but that happiness is fragile. Though Louise quickly bonded with Truley, she was struggling with an all-consuming crush on a young, aloof coworker—and coming to terms with George’s transition. At one point, Louise told her child: “If I can’t call you by the name I gave you at birth, then you can call me by the name I want to be called by.” The painful yet poignant relationship between the two serves as the novel’s nucleus. Jumping between the past and the present, the short vignettes can feel perplexing at times—but they also provide a cataloging of Louise’s life, which, to the novel’s credit, far outshines her disappearance. As the book comes to a close, George considers what might have happened to their mother, including, but not limited to, having had an unfortunate run-in with a violent man or jumping off a bridge during an existential onslaught. George’s last and favorite theory involves Louise forging a new life and identity—just like themself—and, most importantly, includes the two finding each other again. With this theory, Boaz beautifully renders the complicated relationship between mothers and their children: “But I know Louise will recognize me, and I will know them anywhere.” George’s mother may be gone—for now, or for good—but their love endures.

A melancholy novel about imperfect people loving each other imperfectly.