The manga: a college guy meets his childhood friend, who was formerly a boy but is now a woman, and has run away from home after an unspecified disagreement with her family which has left her with a significant amount of trauma; it's implied she was bullied heavily in the time since they've last seen each other.
But don't worry, she's not trans! She just got an illness which turned her into a woman!
The manga: a high school boy with an interest in make-up uses his gloomy, depressed (male) childhood friend as a model to improve his skills. This causes said friend to have an "awakening" and start dressing as a woman, and to overall be a much happier, brighter, outgoing person.
But don't worry, the friend is not trans! He's just a boy who crossdresses because his childhood friend likes him better that way!
The manga: a high school boy joins a club where the members can turn into magical girls, which in his case involves physically transforming into a girl. When in girlmode, he's much happier and enjoys his life much more, and overall prefers staying in girl mode; when the ability to transform is temporarily taken away from him, he sinks into a deep depressive episode.
But don't worry, he's not trans! He's just a boy who enjoys being a girl!
The manga: a college student loses a bet and has to crossdress for a night out on the town, and meets and hooks up with a butch girl; they fall in love and start dating. The boy always crossdressed when they meet, and starts enjoying being "treated like a girl" in the relationship and starts crossdressing even when he doesn't have to meet his girlfriend and enjoys activities such as clothes shopping and make-up and putting on nail polish.
But don't worry, he's not trans! He's just a boy who crossdresses to please his butch girlfriend!
The manga: a guy is magically turned into a girl as a result of saving his best friend, the crown prince, from an assassination attempt. The prince decides that he has to take responsibility, and asks the new girl to marry him; despite being smitten she refuses, wanting to date first. She is later offered a way to go back to being a man, but when she does turn back she's disgusted by her own appearance and depressed all the time, ultimately deciding to stay a girl.
But don't worry, she's not trans! She's just a boy who's been magically turned into a woman! And decides not to turn back when she can! Because she's not trans! Somehow!
"But we can't write trans women in manga! It's just not something that you do!"
ngl, kinda wanna read a couple of these even if they seem a little troublesome.
nah, that's fair enough. i read so much of this stuff in middle school and high school when i was deeply repressed. but i will say i feel way better having mostly switched over to actually trans stories, whether it's manga like love me for who i am or independent stuff on scribblehub like once in a lifetime that do similar stories but are written by trans people and have actual trans characters
There are actually trans stories? That is actually surprising and is preferable since the ones that generally wave off the transness are...not great for the psyche sometimes. I don't like testing on whether I'm having a good day or a bad day by reading something that can make it a really bad day. I'll be damned if the ones in your main post weren't interesting sounding though.
there are a lot of actually trans stories! the one i linked is about a teenager starting a band and trying to prevent their voice from dropping because they just like how it sounds when their singing, and so start taking gray market hrt and crossdressing and pretending to be a girl as a prank and getting really sad whenever they get called male and i wonder what's going on there? it's not done yet (and the mc hasn't yet come out) but i'm having a nice time
alex is about a waiter at a restaurant who has to wear the womans uniform for kind of contrived reasons but then comes to some realizations about herself and has to make some changes in her life to reflect that
kisses, curses, and love is about a family who was cursed so that all their male members would turn into girls when they were first kissed by one. the main characters are blake and angel, trying to get blake her first kiss so she can magically become a girl while angel tries to not be too jealous of her easy hrt
performative masculinity is about a closeted (but transitioning) high school student who makes a new friend and decides she can afford to be more true to herself
show girl is about someone who is forced to dress as a woman because her boss didn't hire enough girls to man the booth at a trade show, only to realize she might be having a really nice time as a woman and that might mean some things
the harem protagonist was turned into a girl!! and doesn't want to change back!!!?? is about the protagonist of a 90s style harem comedy being turned into a girl and deciding she prefers it that way and is definitely trans, and then continues to have wacky harem hijinks
to own the libs is about a conservative convinced that some people must be transitioning in bad faith to take advantage of (???) only to realize (after starting hrt, getting a legal name change and otherwise fully transitioning) that that isn't true and she's much happier than she ever was before
i'm pretty sure these were all written by trans authors and everything. and these are only the ones focused on it! there are a lot of good things written by trans people with more minor trans characters, or with major trans characters where gender isn't the focus (like unjust depths, about submarine mecha communists). the linked stories are all pretty similar in vibes and can get a little saccharine, but they're all reasonably close to the manga example premises
sorry if you meant trans focused manga, i have less recs there, (and a lot of what i have is iffy), but i remember wandering son being good, i'm in love with the villainess has a pretty good trans character apparently (though i haven't read it), to strip the flesh was a good one about a trans man, and the mimosa connection is supposed to be good but isn't translated yet (but will be soon)
Hey, either or works for me. Recently having finished Our LIfe (visual novel), I've been trying to absorb as much trans/trans friendly literature as possible. Anything that makes me feel emotions. Good, bad, whatever. I'm just glad to feel them now.
Anyways, this is a fantastic list. Thank you very much for taking your time for this
if you like visual novels, check out we know the devil, heaven will be mine, or umineko: when they cry! all have trans characters and we know the devil and heaven will be mine are i'm pretty sure entirely written by trans people
we know the devil is about a group of queer teens stuck in a christian summer camp and trying to keep the devil at bay. heaven will be mine is about a bunch of lesbians with giant robots fighting and flirting for ideological control of space. and umineko is a murder mystery where a rich family dies and a witch is blamed that's much longer than the bible
Thanks once again for the recommendations. And thank you Steam sale for being able to put these into my library. I'm going to have to thank you someday for all of this. Seriously.
of course! i'm just really happy to help
one more story for the road, a little vice is about the best friend of a magical girl dealing with how jealous she is of everything about her friend's life while being a very dense egg (that everyone but her sees through). it's very good so far. very much in the sailor moon or precure mold of magical girls, so not too dark outside the protagonist's headspace which is pretty bleak at times. but it's almost certainly going to end with everyone happy