The Risk It Takes to Bloom

On Life and Liberation

By: Raquel Willis

Narrated by: Raquel Willis

A passionate, powerful memoir by a trailblazing Black transgender activist, tracing her life of transformation and her work towards collective liberation.

In 2017, Raquel Willis took to the National Women’s March podium just after the presidential election of Donald Trump, primed to tell her story as a young Black transgender woman from the South. Despite having her speaking time cut short, the appearance only deepened her commitment to speaking up for communities on the margins.

Born in Augusta, Georgia, to Black Catholic parents, Raquel spent years feeling isolated, even within a loving, close-knit family. There was little access to understanding what it meant to be queer and transgender. It wasn’t until she went to the University of Georgia that she found the LGBTQ+ community, fell in love, and explored her gender for the first time. But the unexpected death of her father forced her to examine her relationship with herself and those she loved. These years of grief, misunderstanding, and hard-won epiphanies seeped into the soil of her life, serving as fertilizer for growth and allowing her to bloom within.

Upon graduation, Raquel entered a career in journalism against the backdrop of the burgeoning Movement for Black Lives, intersectional feminism going mainstream, and unprecedented visibility of the trans community. After hiding her identity as a newspaper reporter, her increasing awareness of the epidemic of violence plaguing trans women of color and the heightened suicide of trans teens inspired her to come out publicly.

In The Risk It Takes to Bloom, Raquel Willis recounts with passion and candor her experiences straddling the Obama and Trump eras, the possibility of transformation after tragedy, and how complex moments can push us all to take necessary risks and bloom toward collective liberation.

©2023 Raquel Willis (P)2023 Spotify Audiobooks

Enlightening and Informative

I truly enjoyed this book. I found Raquel's life story to be enlightening and informative. I highly recommend this book to anyone that is interested in learning more about the LGB(T)Q+ community, and/or looking for motivation to overcome the trials and tribulations that life brings.

Representation Matters

Even in literature. I resonated so much with this book. It’s well written and the stories are captivating. I follow Raquel on social media, but getting to know her through this book makes me feel like we are old friends. Thank you, Raquel!

A stunning memoir

This memoir is magnificent in every way. Powerful, heartfelt, and full of integrity. Raquel Willis is a marvel and you cannot help but be drawn into her passion for love and justice in every word.