None of the Above: Reflections on Life Beyond the Binary

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Judge Maisie Chan, who won in the children’s and young adult category last year, said Jawando’s book “is one that speaks to many young people today that have been vilified or who go unheard”. Travis Alabanza is one of the most talented storytellers of a generation. None of the Above is potent, engaging, hilarious, and beautiful, just like Travis.” —Jonathan Van Ness, Emmy-nominated host of Queer Eye and New York Times best-selling author Absolutely stunning. . . . Alabanza is one of the sharpest writers out there and everyone should read this book.” —Ione Gamble, editor in chief of Polyestermagazine

In None of the Above: Reflections on Life Beyond the Binary, Travis Alabanza considers seven phrases people have directed at them throughout their life. These phrases—some deceptively innocuous, some deliberately loaded or violent, some celebratory—have fundamentally shaped Alabanza, both for better and for worse. But these phrases also illuminate broader issues about a world that insists on gender as a fixed identity.As well as a writer, Alabanza is also a performance artist, and in 2017 they became the youngest recipient of an artist residency at the Tate. Their debut show, Burgerz, won the Edinburgh fringe total theatre award in 2019. None of the Above is more than a breath of fresh air. It’s a prison break, a revolt, a wild thumb in the eye of a carceral gender system that tries to bind our flesh into rigid and ranked categories.” —Susan Stryker, author of Transgender History: The Roots of Today’s Revolution None of the Above explores the nuance of self-understanding in an honest, hilarious, and heartfelt way. It is a stunning intersectional interrogation of gender that reads like a conversation with a friend." —Blair Imani, author of Read This to Get Smarter: About Race, Class, Gender, Disability & More Travis Alabanza’s words have power. An essential read for everyone.” —Sam Smith, singer and songwriter

Alabanza’s book has a reflective quality that touches the heart and engages the mind,” said judge Anthony Vahni Capildeo. “It feels like being invited into someone’s interiority.” verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ The book, Jawando said, was “so hard to write”. “For a long time, I thought it was really terrible,” she said. “I lost a lot of confidence with this book.” She said she was “really honoured” to win the prize. Fellow judge Irfan Master said the book stood out for its “craft, courage and connection”, while Yaba Badoe, also judging, said “every teenager” should read the book. Travis Alabanza is a wise, hilarious, and sharp thinker—a writer who not only defies categorization, but who makes categorization itself seem fussy and obsolete.” —Torrey Peters, author of Detransition, Baby: A NovelTravis Alabanza writes about gender and its possibilities with such generosity and ease even the most provocative suggestions start to seem obvious, despite their challenges to society at large. This anti-memoir, which is at times both profound and funny, will make anyone question the stories we tell about ourselves, how we tell them and even who the telling is for.” —Shon Faye, author of The Transgender Issue None of the Above by Travis Alabanza is a thoughtful, stunningly crafted meditation on identity, survival, resilience and defiance that inhabits the personal but also transcends it to speak to universal ethical, moral and human concerns,” she continued. “When Our Worlds Collided is compelling young adult novel that is urgent, necessary and intensely compassionate.”