Queer Sex

4* Interesting and educational insight into trans sex, intimacy and how the trans females portrayed viewed themselves.

The author is a MtF transgender activist, in her 50s, who seems to have spent most of her life trying to find and become her true self, and once she's achieved this physically, has set off in pursuit of emotional and sexual relationships. Not necessarily in person, but via the people she's met and interviewed, and those that have happened to come into her life.

I felt rather sorry for her, because of the age at which she'd transitioned and the feeling of redundancy in the way in which she wrote about her post-op body and what she expected of it, wanted of it and what she did not achieve with it. However, at the end of the book, after reading the accounts of the various transgender couples and singletons she'd met, I felt hopeful that she felt hopeful about her future. I was glad that she is a trans female in the UK, and not some other country where her life might have been made a living hell. And no, I don't for a moment believe that the UK is perfect - Stonewall says that trans hate attacks and transphobia have been on the increase in 2017 - but, for the most, we do have an attitude of live and let live, and especially so in London.

It was humbling to hear of the tales of the trans females, only a couple of whom happened to be under 30, and to hear of their sense of pride and personal achievement once they'd attained their dreams. No two dreams were the same, and no two lives portrayed were, and I found it really interesting to see the contrasts. All seemed to want love and a relationship, some weren't too bothered about the sex side, but more so in the intimacy and relationship-building, and I found the various types of relationship portrayed interesting. I recall one poly, one committed and monogamous, and one committed but polyamorous, if the opportunity arose. I admired their bravery, their commitment to finding and becoming themselves, and that none considered age a burden or an advantage - there were 20 somethings, 30 somethings and people approaching, or actually in, their 50s.

To a straight woman who's taken her body for granted, this is a humbling and thought-provoking read. I did nearly give up at Juno's overly lengthy monologue at the start, wondering if I'd read the blurb wrong and had gotten one woman's tale, but persist and you'll find a book worth reading for the emotional content and for the educational content.

ARC courtesy of NetGalley and Jessica Kingsley Publishers, for my reading pleasure.

I was really interested in this book with the growing conversation about transgender issues, rights, and normalisation in society. While I'm not trans myself, I'm a huge supporter of trans people I know publicly and privately as well as the whole LGBTQ+ community. That being said I never really felt it was my place (or my business!) to ask them about "bottom" surgery or the mechanics of how they would have sex after they transitioning. When I saw this book on NetGalley I was intrigued, as it allowed me to go to these very delicate places I never would have dreamed to going to before and it really was eye-opening!
Juno Roche is an incredibly eloquent and smart woman. She opens the book in an almost confessional tone, talking about her being a "vaginal virgin" with her "neo-vagina" (later on in the book, you come across the term transgina, which I quite like!),
You go through Juno's transition, her desperately thinking that all her problems would be solved once she had the physical features she so desperately desired, but while this was a great experience she doesn't regret, there are many other journeys and things you have to discover about yourself before you can be fully at ease with your body.
Juno interviews various other fascinating transgender, non-binary individuals all over the UK who all reflect on the idea of gender, whether it is infact linked to genitalia or just how you feel. Can a person who identifies as a woman or non-binary be masculine and vice versa? What is it with societies obsession with sex having to equal penetration and can you be happy if your sex life is all in your head?
So many brave and pioneering people, paving the way to do what feels right for them, irregardless of physical form, social conventions or what has or has not been "home-grown".
Juno has bared all and I am grateful to her for this. There are so many new concepts I can't believe I hadn't even thought of before and I feel my understanding of the trans community have only grown and deepened, so I feel I can connect at a deeper level.

I found it a little bit difficult to get into t first, however it was very insightful. It was great to see how certain issues occur in this community and how it may affect them.

It was very open and honest and I did enjoy it.

I've been looking for a book on this topic for a while, so the title instantly caught my attention. Unfortunately, I think I misunderstood what this book was going to be. It was interesting, but I was hoping for something a little more structured than just transcripts of conversations interspersed with the author's history.

While I struggled with some aspects of the interviews (particularly the talk - and assumptions - of drug abuse), and found the narration a little jarring (I had to reread some paragraphs multiple times to get the sense what was being said), Queer Sex was still an interesting read. A Trans and Non-Binary Guide to Intimacy, Pleasure and Relationships flips the gender conversation on its head and makes it about something we are increasingly told should not matter - sex, surgery, and genitals.

Juno Roche uses her own experience as a trans woman to frame the book, talking about her struggles with her neo-vagina, and her troubles with sex and intimacy. Along the way she interviews a wide range of transgender, non-binary, and gender nonconforming people, talking to them about their experiences pre, post, and non transition. Their experiences range from painful stories of bullying and abuse (sometimes self-abuse) to joyful stories of love and affection. There are relationships based on group sex, Tantric masturbation, kissing, and self-intimacy. In some cases penetration is the goal, and in others it is something to be avoided at all costs.

Even knowing as much as I do about the trans community and trans issues, the amount of detail surrounding gender reassignment surgery was still astounding. I knew about the mechanics of things like dilating, but the logistics of depth and width, of construction and placement, and of appearance were fascinating. It is so easy to think of surgery as a be-all and end-all, but we learn that it is just another stage, another step, another tool in the process of self-love.

Most importantly, Queer Sex reinforces the understanding that masculine/feminine, male/female, and straight/gay do not necessarily correspond to one another. Love and intimacy can be found in any combination, and what works for you does not have to work for anyone else.

I have so much experience in my life with trans people. While I am not trans, some of my closest friends are trans, currently transitioning, or considering transitioning. It is so important for these types of texts to exist. Transitioning is a completely overwhelming and terrifying time in one's life. While the transition gets you the body you've always felt you deserved, others' stares and opinions take a toll on you. Trans issues have only begun to be discussed in recent years. This book is a step in the right direction. This book has the potential to guide those transitioning into an easier change. Not only could this book benefit transgender people, it could also enlighten the straight community. It would be great if trans people could stop having to explain themselves or be invaded by personal questions such as what have you got downstairs then? Just hand them this book and you don't even have to deal with it. This text is important and I'm so glad it exists.

This review can also be found on www.queerlyreads.com

Lately the culture wars have been making their way into the queer community. You may be thinking that the queer community has always been part of the culture wars, on the side of the left, but I’m not talking about the culture wars on the level of our whole society. I mean that right now, LGBT culture is having its own microcosmic culture wars—ironically, or perhaps very aptly, one of the major fronts of these wars is happening around whether LGBT, queer, or an infinitely elongated acronym from hell, is the best thing to call our community.

Just like in the macro culture wars, the two sides are roughly the right and the left. Here, they are specialized into the assimilationist side, which seeks to include queer people in the institutions and privilege matrix of the macro culture, and the anti-assimilationist side, which rejects the idea of becoming part of a culture that only a decade ago was upholding Don’t Ask Don’t Tell in the Supreme Court, and which three decades ago allowed a plague to ravage our community without even speaking openly about our existence. As you can see, just like in the macro culture wars, the stakes here are no less than the culture itself, its very soul.

Souls are intangible, and the souls of communities even more so. How, then, is this battle for the soul of queer culture playing out in practicality? Culture wars are fought over culture, but they are also fought through culture—while economics and legislation are often involved, the main theater of war here is the stories we tell (both to ourselves and others) to make sense of who we are. As with other marginalized population, any story about us is taken as a definitive statement that applies to all of us. On the flip side, each story about us is another affirmation that we are gaining toeholds in the macro culture wars. The question is: What kind of toeholds are we trying to gain?

Gaining these toeholds is definitely important—from narrative liberation, all other forms of liberation flow, because under late capitalism, propaganda is the de facto currency underlying all forms of existence. To stay alive, you have to beg Middle America to vote to keep you that way. But what portion of our stories should be this queer PR, campaign outreach-style approach, rather than a truthful expression of our reality? And what if this queer PR starts to affect how our own community functions? What if life starts to imitate this assimilationist art, such that we begin to simplify and sanitize ourselves in accordance with these flattened-out narratives?

With that lengthy contextualization, I bring you my main thesis: telling queer stories is weird. Read the queer stories in this book, and maybe together we can make it all a little easier.

Juno Roche’s exploratory book Queer Sex is the story of a trans woman over 50 who is reconnecting with her body and her sexuality. Roche has been involved in queer scenes for decades, but has been held back from sex and intimacy by her disconnection from her body, even after her transition. In a search for herself, Roche interviews other queer activists and artists about their own self-discoveries; her interviews with them, and meditations on what she learned from each interviewee’s relationship to their gender and sexuality, is the meat of the book. As you prepare for your next skirmish in the culture wars, this book and its voices can open up new possibilities for what kind of soldier you can be.

A queer reader will be able to find bits of their ideal selves in the accomplished, experimental, and confident queer people this book has to offer as its interviewees. Just as importantly, though, they will see themselves in Juno Roche’s narration, which is just as clueless and questing when it comes to sex/everything as many queers are, even after years of being out and about in the queer community. The people in these interviews offer perspectives that are liberating and affirming to read, especially to me as a genderqueer person, and especially especially because they offer an illustration of why trans and nonbinary identities are the ones that have often been left behind by the mainstreamer contingent of the queer culture wars.

There are a lot of queer stories that focus on the experience of coming out, or the journey leading up to it. In these stories, the protagonist starts out thinking they’re straight, or maybe knowing they’re not but not ready to be open about it, and then once they tell everyone in their immediate social circles that they’re queer, they self-actualize, maybe find a queer partner, and then there’s a feel-good ending to top it all off. These protagonists are gay or lesbian, and always cis, without the B or T parts of the acronym making appearances at all. There’s a movie out now called Love, Simon that looks like a poster child for this trope. 

These stories seem to think that the process of finding one’s identity as a queer person ends with coming out, when really that’s just the beginning—I don’t think I know a single queer person living in a happy ending right now. The “coming out” brand of story serves an assimilationist narrative, because these stories tend to put a “gays—they’re just like us!” spin on queerness that seeks to place queers within the architecture of cis-het privilege, under the guise of a push for liberation and equality. Same capitalist wedding cake, different figures on top.

The narratives in Queer Sex are not those queer stories. The narratives the interviewees give are not totalizing or simple—few of them have cut and dried answers to give about their identity, and when they give advice they focus on the need for everyone to find their own way to self-acceptance and peace. These people are not neatly packaged, nor is their queerness. A straight person reading Queer Sex might not know what to make of it, because these stories aren’t packaged for the consumption of a straight reader—and that’s exactly why queer people will love them.

Queer Sex shows that queer identity is about both exploration and experimentation—who you are, and who you want to be. Are those two things inextricable? Yes! I think most queer people will agree with me when I say that creating one’s own identity is one of the central projects of any queer person’s life. It’s not just the usual finding yourself that most people do during youth—more than for any straight person, the queer journey of self-discovery involves a lot of unlearning, and re-conceiving of what’s possible.

The culture we’re born into comes with rigid guidelines for straight people. People who identify as straight (or people who simply live as straight to blend in) get a clear set of standards for how to mold and present their bodies. When I adopt straight modes of behavior I do not need to be told what to do. This is true whether I’m thinking of the phenomenon in terms of Margaret Atwood’s inner man, an internalized agent of patriarchy watching me from inside my own mind, or as Foucault’s panopticon, an external, violent force which may or may not be watching me at any moment, but which I can’t afford to assume is not.

What I’m trying to say is that I am my own gender police. I know how to tell the lie that is womanhood; I could probably tell it in my sleep. Ironically, it is my truth that I have to figure out how to tell. Juno Roche is still figuring her truth out too. As the kids say, she’s relatable af.

For queer people, both our liberation and our restriction is that we have no blueprints to construct our selves with. All the characters in Queer Sex have to build their selves from the ground up. This exploration that each of us is doing every moment we exist as ourselves is like any cultural exploration, in that our findings are ultimately political. The straight narratives and codes we get before we begin our journeys bind us. They also bind straight people, because they were made to bind straight people. If, in creating our own narratives, we begin to bind ourselves anew, then we won’t have achieved anything but the repetition of our own oppression in a microcosm.

Foucault considers knowledge to be a form of power. Since knowledge, and ways of creating knowledge, are constructed by society, they reflect the system of power at work in society. When we classify people as “straight” or “gay,” we invest those categories with a power differential. The reason we classify people as “straight” or “gay,” is in service to and for the reproduction of this power differential. Additionally, any queer person who has ever been in the closet knows very intimately that knowledge is power when it comes to identity. Knowing what we know about knowing, then, when straight society looks into ours and wants to know us, we should be suspicious.

While there are large, seemingly decisive battles in the culture wars, such as the Supreme Court decisions and Oscar victories, it would be a mistake to feel like these are the only parts of these wars that matter. I don’t want to be that guy who keeps talking about Foucault, but Foucault also speaks of power not as a binary, oppression or freedom with no in-between, but rather as a constructed set of systems whose goal is to police the body, and which operates on the level of each individual body in a “microphysics” of power. Power is not “univocal,” it has “innumerable points of confrontation…each of which has its own risks of conflict, of struggles, of an at least temporary inversion of power relations.”

It is this microphysics of power that is the everyday slog of the culture wars. When we name power, when we come to know it, we can reverse its own dynamics against it, if only incrementally. This can also happen when we name and know ourselves. In all your coming battles, remember that identity is a story—one that you tell about yourself, to yourself as well as to others, with the medium being your body. Queer Sex is about joyfully learning to tell the story of your body, to and with other people (and yourself). It could contain within its pages the role model you’re looking for, or just make you feel less alone as one of those queer people who doesn’t feel represented by the characters in Rent or Glee. These stories, our stories, are vital, and deserve to be told.

In Queer Sex: A Trans and Non-Binary Guide to Intimacy, Pleasure and Relationships, Juno Roche describes her quest to understand her sexuality in light of her gender reassignment surgery. As someone who went through surgery in her middle age, Roche tackles the topic of her “vaginal virginity” and how to lose it in her fifties. Hence her journey to better understand herself and her sexual identity through a series of five interviews with transgender and non-binary activists, artists and acquaintances.

I can imagine that some people may be put off by how blunt the title Queer Sex is. It’s something you may be embarrassed to be seen reading on the bus, or overheard telling your best friend you’re really enjoying. Regardless of the title, the content of the book is not purely sexual. Roche explores the emotional side to sex, through her own experiences as well as through her choice of interviewees. The first segment “Owl and Fox” features a couple discussing how they met, and how their initial sexual connection mirrored their emotional one. Roche describes with admiration and envy the affection between the two, feelings that are repeated in the final interview “Kuchenga” when she is told the story of a two-year-long romance between Kuchenga and her partner before they had sex. Despite the book’s main topic being sex and pleasure, love and romance play a major part, and the connections between love and sex are examined throughout.

Something that I really appreciated about the book was it’s demystifying the process of sex reassignment surgery to those of us who aren’t very familiar with it: the topic of hormone replacement therapy and dilation are discussed, as well as how these processes have affected their sex drives. It’s a very personal look into these people’s emotions and sex lives, as we see how surgery changes a person’s opinions of their own sexual identity, and what they look for in a partner. In the second interview “Margo Megan and Jaye” Megan says that despite her attraction pre-op being towards women exclusively, post-op this had changed to go beyond a person’s gender and genitalia, therefore resembling something closer to pansexuality.

The topic of the characters lives pre-transition also led to some interesting topics; whilst several of them explained that they were not able to enjoy sex before surgery, others admitted to having healthy sex lives before realising/coming out as trans. Some even say that they have no intention of undergoing surgery, and allude to the “no-op” stance. This leads us to consider whether the physical side of transitioning is truly always necessary, or rather for some people a social matter; if society could accept that penises can be feminine and vaginas masculine, would sex reassignment surgery be pushed the way it is?

I found Queer Sex to be a valuable contribution to the recent trend of LGBTQ+ nonfiction from a gifted writer and interviewer. It taught me about elements of transitioning that I was unaware of and sparked an interesting discussion on gender, genitalia and sex. I’m interested to see what Roche comes up with next, especially given the note that Queer Sex ended on; one of acceptance and learning, and excitement for what the future may hold for her and her journey to self discovery.

Most sex education is aimed at straight cisgender people and can exclude those outside of this definition and leave them without the information they need. There is a growing number of resources for LGB+ people, but there is still very little for trans and/or non-binary people. Trans men and non-binary people are often made invisible. Meanwhile, trans women are sexualised as objects, but their own wants, needs and desires are ignored. This book fights back against this marginalisation and focuses on trans and/or non-binary people reclaiming discussion space and ownership of their own bodies.

I had expected it to be a guide or resource, along the lines of Mira Bellwether's zine, but it is a very different format. In the introduction, the author discusses her own life, insecurities and relationship with her body. The rest of the chapters feature interviews with trans and/or non-binary people from a wide range of ages and backgrounds, along with the author's personal reflections on these conversations.

The book is unflinchingly honest and personal as the author and her interviewees set out to break taboos and the silence around trans people's bodies and sexuality. They discuss the medicalisation of trans bodies and the way fitting into a binary narrative- including the way surgery is seen as a necessary end point- has been pushed on people whether they want it or not. They talk about a growing trend for trans people to build supportive communities with other trans or queer people, rather than relying on outside approval and validation from mainstream society. They discuss things which are still seen as taboo to discuss, even among trans communities, such as the way transitioning (socially and medically) are presented as a magic cure to every problem in a person's life- such as loneliness, which is a common issue but especially affects trans and/or non-binary people- and the confusion and disappointment when this turns out not to be the case.

I would recommend this to any trans and/or non-binary person, or someone questioning their gender. It doesn't have all the answers, but it raises a lot of questions, shows a variety of different viewpoints and promotes honest communication over living in silence. I would also recommend it to people in the LGB+ community looking to become more aware of trans issues and be more incusive.

I can’t really rate this book. I don’t feel like I’d be legitimate to.

I will, however, tell you what I felt while reading it.

I thought the content of the book was pretty powerful and could be very useful to trans and non-binary people.
But I wouldn’t call it a guide. It felt pretty personal to the author and it was more about her journey than anything else. It was still very interesting but really didn’t read like a guide.

Finally, the writing style wasn’t for me. I found her sentences to be too long and just overall, I had trouble staying focused.

I don’t know what to add so I’ll stop now.

Long review copied from blog

Since these books, share a similar focus, I am going to review them together. They both deal with transgender experiences of all kinds, outlining; the physical nature of living as a transgender individual, the violence that the authors have experienced as a product of society's hostility to their identity, the authors' experience of the various aspects of the transgender/queer experience, their feelings concerning their own identity, the authors' relationships with their physicality, and the variety of changes that can occur within bodies undergoing a varied array of transitioning experience.

Written on the Body is in the form of letters to various parts of the physical torso. They look at the authors' ambiguous relationships with various aspects of their physicality. Some authors explore the effects of physical, and sexual violence, on their feelings towards the chosen body part. While others, discuss what happens when a body part feels wrong or uncomfortable. They discuss their struggles to come to terms with a body that feels at odds with their perceived identity. These letters are moving and insightful. They are a must read for anyone; undergoing transition, anyone who is thinking of undergoing the process, those who identify as transgender/queer, or anybody who simply wishes to get a glimpse into the experiences of queer/transgender individuals.

Queer sex begins with the author's exploration of their relationship with their body and their physicality/ sexuality. The author then goes on a; physical, emotional and spiritual journey. In the course of their journey, the main author speaks to their mentors about their experiences of; living in their body, navigating a world that is often hostile to that body, and finding a way to live their own chosen identity. These conversations deal with issues of; confusion, pain, self realisation, growing self confidence and pride.




Queer sex deals with issues, of; self hate, social norms and their effects on our self image, self love, pride, and self empowerment. It grounds personal experience in; communal narrative, and an existing theoretical framework; thus, providing a multilayered investigation of a slice of the queer experience. It is well worth a read

As a Cis disabled woman, these books: gave me a glimpse of an experience that I cannot share. At the same time, the stories of the narrators' lives allowed me to dwell on my own experience of living in an, occasionally, hostile body. Therefore, reading these books was an emotionally moving, challenging, empowering, and ultimately joyous experience. These books are worth a read

Short review for other sites.


Queer sex begins with the author's exploration of their relationship with their body and their physicality/ sexuality. The author then goes on a; physical, emotional and spiritual journey. In the course of their journey, the main author speaks to their mentors about their experiences of; living in their body, navigating a world that is often hostile to that body, and finding a way to live their own chosen identity. These conversations deal with issues of; confusion, pain, self realisation, growing self confidence and pride.




Queer sex deals with issues, of; self hate, social norms and their effects on our self image, self love, pride, and self empowerment. It grounds personal experience in; communal narrative, and an existing theoretical framework; thus, providing a multilayered investigation of a slice of the queer experience. It is well worth a read

book with good direction, especially for people new to the queer community like myself. hopefully this will lead to more books like this for me.