Elliott DeLine (born 1988) is a writer from Syracuse, NY. He is the author of the novel Refuse, the novella I Know Very Well How I Got My Name, Show Trans: A Nonfiction Novel, and No Poster Boy: Trans Fag Essays. In June 2021 he released his first poetry chapbook, Lessons Learned from Chickens. His essays and excerpts have been featured in The New York Times, The Collection: Short Fiction from the Transgender Vanguard, Original Plumbing Magazine and The Advocate. He currently lives in upstate, NY.
Praise:
“Elliott’s writing also helps people with similar experiences feel less alone… {He} honestly shares his struggles and his insights, and this sharing helps us all feel our common humanity beyond our gender identities or orientation.”
-Dana Spiotta, Author of Stone Arabia and Wayward
“Like so many of the classic gay and lesbian novels from the earlier part of the 20th century, these works
are sure, years from now, to enjoy wider readership and recognition as pioneering examples of
transgender writing. Moreover, DeLine’s well-crafted storytelling and skill at cultivating voice prove that,
far from being a niche genre, transgender narratives by transgender authors are a welcome and still
underrepresented presence in contemporary fiction today.”
-Jameson Fitzpatrick, poet, Kirkus Review.
“Elliott is writing at the cutting-edge of modern-day culture—with his relentless and compassionate
narration of young people living out complexities of multiple sexes, genders, and sexualities. His visually
and textually dynamic memoir and fiction thoroughly engage the reader and give us a window into the
everyday living of life in-between rigid boundaries of male and female, man and woman, straight and
gay.”
-Minnie Bruce Pratt, author of S/he, Crime Against Nature, and Inside the Money Machine.
“[Refuse is] a witty and provocative debut novel chronicling a young, intelligent, and deeply insecure protagonist, Dean, through his ambivalent attempts at securing love and connection within and without the transgender community.”
-TT Jaxx, Lambda Literary Review
“Elliott DeLine is an ambitious, witty, self-deprecating, thoughtful writer whose debut novel Refuse could meaningfully be compared to the work of Dennis Cooper (with far less violence), Brett Easton Ellis (with far fewer chemical substances), David Sedaris (with not as many belly laughs) and Leslie Feinberg (with a much less mournful air). Conversant with the queer coming-of-age narrative, the disaffected-youth novel and the transgender memoir—as well as the feminist and gender theory that each of these literary genres has inspired—DeLine pushes back against the familiar, and safe, conventions of these sources to produce a captivating story populated by fully rendered, completely believable characters who, while not always likable, and never the objects of pity, somehow manage to make an affective claim on the reader. With this as his debut effort, DeLine, not yet out of college, is a writer to watch.”
-Jerry Wheeler, Out in Print Queer Book Reviews
“Refuse is a stunning debut “novoir” about an over-observant young outsider with really great hair who is outside everything – including the transgender community – but keeps a great deal bottled up inside. Funny, cynical, tough, vulnerable, honest, deluded, sagacious, self-loving and self-loathing, Refuse is irresistible.”
-Mark Simpson, author of Saint Morrissey
Books
● Refuse, 2011
● I Know Very Well How I Got My Name, 2013
● Show Trans, 2014
● No Poster Boy, 2016
Other Publications
● “Stuck at the Border Between the Sexes.” The New York Times. 2011.
● “Stages of Visibility,” Intertext, the journal of the Syracuse University Writing Program. 2012
● “Dean and Teddy.” The Collection: Short Fiction from the Transgender Vanguard. Topside
Press. 2012.
● “Just Come in From the Rain: A Reluctant Transgender Activist…” QED: A Journal in LGBT Worldmaking.
Michigan State University Press. 2015
Honors
● 2015 Refuse named one of IndieReader.com’s “Favorite Indie LGBT Books”
● 2015 Voted “Author of the Year” by FTM Magazine’s readership
● 2014 Show Trans one of Top Transgender Nonfiction Books of the Year, The Advocate.com
● 2014 Named one the “12 Inspirational Trans Leaders Under 30,” Community Digital News
● 2013 “Unrecognized Artist of the Year,” San Francisco Museum of Transgender Hirstory and Art
● 2013 Rainbow Award, I Know Very Well How I Got My Name, 1st place for Best Transgender
Fiction.
● 2013 41 Trans Friendly Titles for Young Adults, Young Adult Library Association, Refuse
● 2012 Lambda Literary Award, Contributor to The Collection: Short Fiction from the Transgender
Vanguard, for Best Transgender Fiction.
● 2012 Recipient of the Louise Weatherbee Phelps Award for Outstanding Writing, “Stages of
Visibility,” Syracuse University.
● 2011 Finalist, New York Times’ Modern Love Essay Contest, “Stuck at the Border.”
● 2011 Rainbow Awards, Refuse, Honorable Mention for Best LGBT Coming of Age/Young Adult
Novel. Bronze for Best Bisexual/Transgender Novel. Silver for Best Debut Transgender Novel.
Elliott DeLine, Author 