A Dream of a Woman

Casey Plett's 2018 novelLittle Fishwon a Lambda Literary Award, the Firecracker Award for Fiction, and the Amazon First Novel Award. Her latest work,A Dream of a Woman, is her first book of short stories since her seminal 2014 collectionA Safe Girl to Love. Centering transgender women seeking stable, adult lives,A Dream of a Womanfinds quiet truths in prairie high-rises and New York warehouses, in freezing Canadian winters and drizzly Oregon days.

In "Hazel and Christopher," two childhood friends reconnect as adults after one of them has transitioned. In "Perfect Places," a woman grapples with undesirability as she navigates fetish play with a man. In "Couldn't Hear You Talk Anymore," the narrator reflects on her tumultuous life and what might have been as she recalls tender moments with another trans woman.

An ethereal meditation on partnership, sex, addiction, romance, groundedness, and love, the stories inA Dream of a Womanbuzz with quiet intensity and the intimate complexities of being human. (From Arsenal Pulp Press)

A Dream of a Womanwas onthe 2021 Scotiabank Giller Prize longlist.

Casey Plett is a Windsor-based writer who was born in Manitoba and has lived in Oregon and New York. Her novelLittle Fishwon the Lambda Literary Award, Amazon First Novel Award and the Firecracker Award for Fiction. Her first collection of short stories,A Safe Girl to Love, was published in 2014.

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Why Casey Plett wrote A Dream of a Woman

"When I was younger, I didn't see many trans people but there were no stories about the trans people I did see. Trans characters were either heroes or villains. They were either these evil people who are deceivers and who are 'crazy' or these beautiful 'Disney hero angels' who are besetby tragedy, but could do no wrong or were struggling against the harsh world. That's just not the reality of how most people's lives go.

When I was younger, I didn't see many trans people but there were no stories about the trans people I did see.- Casey Plett

"People do a lot of good stuff. But people also do a lot of really evil crap at some point in their life. So, because I saw no three-dimensional real people when I was younger, that was hurtful to me. That was harmful to me."

Read more in her interview with CBC Books.

Other books by Casey Plett