Jodie Patterson Knihy

Jodie Patterson, activist and Chair of the Human Rights Campaign Foundation Board, shares her transgender son's experience in this important picture book about identity and acceptance.Penelope knows that he's a boy. (And a ninja.) The problem is getting everyone else to realize it.In this exuberant companion to Jodie Patterson's adult memoir, The Bold World, Patterson shares her son Penelope's frustrations and triumphs on his journey to share himself with the world. Penelope's experiences show children that it always makes you stronger when you are true to yourself and who you really are.

In 2009, Jodie Patterson, mother of five and beauty entrepreneur, has her world turned upside down when her determined toddler, Penelope, reveals, "Mama, I'm not a girl. I am a boy". The Pattersons are a tribe of unapologetic black matriarchs, scholars, financiers, activists, artists, musicians, and disruptors, but with Penelope's revelation, Jodie realizes that her existing definition of family isn't wide enough for her child's needs. Jodie has to reshape her own attitude, beliefs, and biases, learning from her children, and a whole new community, on how to meet the needs of her transgender son