Virtual Women: Ladyboys, Changing Sex in Thailand by Anne Beaumont is due for publication shortly and we’re very pleased to add this intelligent and thoughtful book to the YouCaxton list.

Why do some people reject the sexed bodies they were born into and transform themselves into women? Are the brains of men and women different? Is gender identity fixed at birth, is it learned behaviour or is it socially constructed? In this scholarly work, social anthropologist Anne Beaumont shows us that the answers to these prickly questions lie as much in the sphere of cultural difference as in that of science, and she constructs a new framework for gendering the body – one that centres solely on the individual.

Virtual Women takes us from England to Thailand, to the twilight zone of the bars where genders blend into a human hybrid – the Ladyboys (Kathoey) of Thailand who live betwixt and between in sex. Drawing on extensive empirical research and on interviews with Kathoey and with British transsexual women and with the surgeons and psychiatrists involved, Virtual Women brings a new understanding of the transgender phenomenon.

Books in the news

Three books reviewed in The Scotsman by Matt Qvortrup:

Scottish Independence: Yes or No? by Alan Cochrane and George Kerevan, The History Press, £7.99

Arts of Independence, by Alexander Moffat and Alan Riach, Luath Press, £9.99

Yes: the Radical Case for Scottish Independence, James Foley and Pete Ramand, Pluto Press, £12

To which might be added: Referendums and Ethnic Conflict by Matt Qvortrup himself, published by University of Pennsylvania Press, for a more scholarly take on these matters.

We have just published a new edition of Why Darwin Matters to Christians, Adrian Bailey’s take on the appropriate response of Christians to the scientific revolution and to Darwinism in particular. Adrian is Chaplain of the Robert Jones and Agnes Hunt Orthopaedic Hospital, Oswestry. This well-argued book has proved to be of interest to many, both Christian and non-Christian.

The obituary of Sue Townsend in the Independent describes how Richmal Crompton’s William became the inspiration for Adrian Mole.

For anyone interested in memoir, there’s an excellent review by Paul Binding in the Spectator of the third volume of Karl Ove Knausgaard’s six-volume autobiographical trilogy, Boyhood Island. (Translation of the last three volumes into English is not yet complete.) Knausgaard’s Proustian take on the nature of memory holds a warning for anyone embarking on a memoir. It is: ‘pragmatic, sly and artful’.

Shropshire War Memorial, Sites of Remembrance by Peter Francis will be launched on 27 October at Shrewsbury Library. A complete gazetteer of all Shropshire war memorials with a wealth of historical and anecdotal background, we have been delighted to be associated with this very worthwhile project.

The Man Booker Prize for Commonwealth novels, won previously by Commonwealth writers  such as Salman Rushdie, is about to open its doors to include American writers. This appears to be, at least partially, in response to the new Folio Prize which is open to all writing in the English language and starts next year. There is an article in the Independent which explains in further detail.