Woman of the Year 2019: Amanda Jetté Knox

Love Lives Here, Amanda Jetté Knox’s memoir about “thriving as a trans family,” spent nearly two months on the best-seller list this year. She had to double her anxiety medication by week two. “Success is scary,” she admits. “It’s so closely tied to my family, to the people I love and to my personal life. It is a very vulnerable place to be.” But that vulnerability is exactly what has allowed the award-winning writer and human-rights advocate to make such an impact. After one of Jetté Knox’s kids and her spouse came out as transgender within a year of one another, she found a new purpose: to normalize queer lives, transitions and people being their authentic selves. “I speak to other people like me and teach them that our differences make us stronger,” she says. And she’s not done yet. She’s brainstorming a second book, just started a YouTube channel (“The kids made me do it,” she says) and plans to speak more on mental illness, body image, intersectional feminism and, of course, trans rights. “The goal is that nobody wants to know about us anymore. When that happens, that means my job is done,” she says. “I plan to make myself obsolete.”

Meet all of our 2019 Women of the Year here.