Falling Back in Love with Being Human: Letters to Lost Souls by Kai Cheng Thom
A transformative collection of intimate and lyrical love letters that offer apath toward compassion, forgiveness, and self-acceptance.
What happens when we imagine loving the people—and the parts of ourselves—that we do not believe are worthy of love?
Kai Cheng Thom grew up a Chinese Canadian transgender girl in a hostile world. As an activist, counselor, conflict mediator, and spiritual healer, she's always pursuedthe same deeply personal mission: to embrace the revolutionary belief that every human being, no matter how hateful or horrible, is intrinsically sacred.
But then Kai Cheng found herself in a crisis of faith, overwhelmed by the violence with which people treated one another, and barely clinging to the values and dreams she'd built her life around: justice, hope, love, and healing. Rather than succumb to despair and cynicism, she gathered all her rage and griefand took one last leap of faith: she wrote. She wrote letters that were prayers, or maybe poems, or perhaps magic spells. She wrote to the outcasts and runaways she calls her kin. She wrote to flawed but nonetheless lovable men, to people with good intentions who harm their own, to racists and transphobes seemingly beyond saving. What emerged was a blueprint for falling back in love with being human.
About the Author
KAI CHENG THOM is a writer, performance artist, and community healer. She is the author of the novel Fierce Femmes and Notorious Liars, which was chosen by Emma Watson for her online feminist book club and shortlisted for the Lambda Literary Award. Her poetry collection a place called No Homeland was an American Library Association Stonewall Honor Book, and her essay collection, I Hope We Choose Love,received a Publishing Triangle Award. She writes the advice column “Ask Kai: Advice for the Apocalypse” for Xtra.
