An Army of Lovers Cannot Fail by Hélène Giannecchini

 friendship is a filiation we choose. It holds love and laughter; it can extend our sense of the possible. Moved to honour a form of relation often subordinated to romantic and familial ties, and to explore a part of her own history, Hélène Giannecchini pieces together an alternative genealogy of queer ancestors.

In searching and sensitive prose, she sifts the past to bring existences deemed ‘marginal’ into communion with each other, traces of which may remain only in memory and archival fragments. Roving from Casa Susanna, a space of freedom from persecution in McCarthyite North America, to the diary of a man living with HIV in France, and to the life and work of pioneering lesbian photographer Donna Gottschalk, each narrative counters oblivion through loving acts of witness. A slantwise gathering of queer life and activism in the twentieth century, interspersed with images encountered by chance, An Army of Lovers Cannot Fail establishes friendship as a vital political force and offers a moving testament to its liberatory power.
 
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'We could be friends, we could be lovers, we could be comrades. Queer people are specialists in the art of chosen families because we have to be. Giannecchini’s book is not just about such bonds, it’s made by making them. In a world intent on crushing us all into isolated particles, this is an essential guide for everyone in how to glue together a fuller and deeper life.’
― McKenzie Wark, author of Love and Money, Sex and Death
 
'What a stunning, deep book! Giannecchini has dug down to the marrow, to find the sparkling cells that queer people through the ages have always made – the lights we’ve used to find each other. I am so relieved that this book found me, because life without books like these, as without friends, is lonely. Giannecchini’s work is to listen hard, to the voices of our queer elders, and to the signals from her own heart, and to share her findings with the world – we are all richer for her work. The writing shines; it is always brief, but never fast. Always thoughtful, but never heavy. I couldn’t stop reading, and I want to start again immediately.’
― Adam Zmith, author of Solemates