Lesbian Love Story

 Lesbian Love Story: A Memoir in Archives by Amelia Possanza, 288 pages.

Author Amelia Possanza often felt starved of a lesbian community, or of lesbian role models to help he build up her idea of herself. This book is an attempt to dig into the historical record to find both the records the lesbians through the 20th century left behind, and the places that they were scrubbed from the archives. Possanza makes no promises of a neutral history. Rather, the whole premise of this book is using these stories of the women who came before to help her construct herself. The scope is wide-reaching, organized by decades across the United States, but with a special focus on Possanza's home in New York City. It is at times philosophical, at times historical, but always very honest.

I was very impressed by this book. Possanza expertly managed to avoid doing the thing that annoys me in many nonfiction books about historically neglected topics do; she is always extremely clear what was fact and what is speculation. I was also touched by how personal this journey was for the author. It felt like being invited into something intimate, and by the end you can't help but feel you know her. I was also impressed by how neatly she connected the many threads of this book, bringing past and present together seamlessly, as well as fact and fancy. This is an impressive piece of nonfiction that feels longer than it is, and I would definitely recommend it to others.