About The Author

Daniels lacks an expansive online presence, so my information is limited. She is a transgender woman, and Dreadnought was her first book. The Dreadnought series consists of a second book, Sovereign, and a third in progress. 

Summary 

Danielle (Danny) Tozer struggles to live with her appearance as a closeted trans kid. When a well-known superhero, Dreadnought, dies in front of her, she inherits his powers, as well as her dream body. Suddenly, Danielle’s looks are everything she’s ever dreamed of. Her parents, however, refuse to believe this is their daughter’s truth, and are continually transphobic and hateful to her. Danny joins the superhero legion, and strives to become a hero herself. She is thrown into navigating being a superhero, coming out, and accepting herself all in one jumbled, confusing mix. 

Characters 

Coming out can alter relationships significantly; this novel showed that. David, Danny’s best friend of many years, starts to make sexual comments to her after her physical change. He says some horrible, but realistic, things. Danielle retells, “My best friend in the world called me a tranny and said he hoped someone would rape me.” (Page 144) This, devastatingly, is not only a fictional comment. 

The legion consists of people of various stances. Doctor Impossible and Valkyrja attempt to be supportive, while others are flat out transphobic. This causes Danny to feel welcome only with certain people in specific places. She doesn’t feel a part of the legion as a whole. 

Calamity was an amazing, daring, and clever character. She’s a black, cowgirl, vigilante who knows how to navigate the streets. Calamity takes Danielle under her wing, and they become friends (and possibly more?). Pieces of her backstory are meagerly uncovered as she and Danielle go on all sorts of missions together.

Danielle’s parents are cruel to her, they don’t accept her. When faced with the thought of her father being killed by a supervillain, Danny thinks,

“Kill him. Please.

I’m a horrible person.

But so is he!

But he’s my father, I can’t let him die.

But he deserves it!”

Page 173

Her inner monologue faces a battle that makes her question what family means and if her father deserves to be treated how he’s treated her.  

Unfortunately, most of the characters in this novel lacked depth. Danny’s parents are transphobic; Danny is trans; David is a jerk. That’s it. These characters, as well as some of the other cast members, only had these main traits and no other personality. I found Calamity to be the most engaging (and awesome) character, while the others fell flat. Other interests, hobbies, and details of most characters failed to be present. This caused the book to feel shallow and imprecise.  

Themes 

The characters in this novel are very black and white on how they view gender and sexuality. Often, it isn’t so simple. People are transphobic, but people also are uneducated, afraid, and ignorant. Transphobia can be unintentional from a misled perspective. I think Dreadnought had an untaken opportunity to delve more into these ideas of transphobia and all the gray space around hate and discrimination. Danielle is a binary trans person, the most represented genderqueer identity, and she experiences transphobia because people don’t accept her. It’s often not so black and white. 

There were three main themes: gender, superheroes, and mental health. Danny struggles with her mental health, just as any trans person. Having the “right” body¹ is only part of the equation;

“I start crying again because I realize I still hate myself.”

Page 100

Danielle uses a lot of hateful words when talking about herself, calling herself weak or stupid. The reality is that this is the reality of many trans people. 

There is a lot of hate speech in this novel, which may cause discomfort. And that’s good! Read to feel discomfort, especially if it isn’t your identities being represented. Danny experiences endless hateful and unsolicited comments, from a variety of slurs to

“Smile dear, it can’t be that bad”

Page 183

from a random guy on the train. If you cannot read hate speech and slurs, this is not the book for you. The comment from the older guy on the train shows that when Danny is perceived as a cis girl, her experience of doing things, like riding the train, changes. Women face a very different reality than men, especially in public spaces. This could have been a larger aspect of the book, but it was not. 

Expression is so crucial for genderqueer people. Dreadnought begins with Danny painting her toenails behind the mall, a small and discreet way of expression. The only expression accessible to her. When she sees her new body, she states,

“It feels right. It feels necessary.”

Page 127

It is key that trans people can express themselves, and Danielle feels this in her own experience. When she didn’t have available ways to express herself, and the result could have been death. Suicide rates in trans kids are drastic. LGBTQIA+ kids are four times more likely to commit suicide² than cishet people. Representation and gender affirming care are suicide prevention; Danielle didn’t have access to either of those. Danny says to her mom,

“I was going to die.”

Page 209

She wasn’t just being dramatic. 

At the end of the book, Danielle is able to own her identities publicly. While this isn’t feasible to a lot of kids, it’s something that allowed Danny to be herself and be known.

“‘I’m transgender, and a lesbian, and I’m not ashamed of that.’”

Page 308

It’s a powerful moment in the novel to see Danny accept herself after facing so many people they didn’t. She embraces self love and confidence as she moves forward on her journey. 

Takeaways 

This novel was a unique mix of ideas and subjects. Trans folx are underrepresented, and it’s refreshing to read about things such as trans superheroes. Marvel and DC are shifting to include more LGBTQIA+ characters, it’s good to see trans people in more settings. This book wasn’t quite for me due to the fantasy aspects, but that’s just my personal experience. Dreadnought had some potential it didn’t completely fill, but it also did introduce a lot of significant themes. This novel is important. I love and appreciate that it’s by a trans person about a trans person, and that it’s different from other coming-of-age novels. 

1. The right body is a term often used about trans people that enforces the idea that the only correct bodies are cis bodies, and maybe those who alter their bodies to appear as close to cis as they can. Trans bodies don’t require any changing, and many people find contentment and joy without changing their bodies, while others do seek out physical gender affirming care. Any way genderqueer people choose to present is valid and deserves to be respected. Danny felt strongly about having an AFAB body, and she got pretty much what she wanted. Even if this hadn’t been the case, her identity would still have been valid. She could work to shed traditional ideas of how bodies should correspond to gender, and find herself in her body by doing other things. The cisnormative societal concepts often fuel the self hatred of genderqueer people. If people didn’t think they had to hate their bodies maybe they wouldn’t feel so intensely about changing them. 
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2. See more at https://www.thetrevorproject.org/resources/article/facts-about-lgbtq-youth-suicide/ 
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