Review of 'Almost Life' - Kiran Millwood Hargrave

Sometimes, life is perfect, and sometimes, it's real and you have to find a way of living it anyway. Erica and Laure meet as young women, in what is often described as the most romantic city in the world, Paris. Their affair is intense, but Erica is due to start her degree back in England and so both know it will probably come to an end. But what if they don't want it to? Sometimes, you meet a lover you don't want to let go. However, life might have other plans for you.

Meeting again a few years later, again in Paris, the two women are drawn together once more, but fail to resolve the differences which drove them apart and they are parted again. Over the next years, they sporadically come together again and this is largely driven by Erica's inability to accept her life the way it is and Laure's inability to let Erica go once and for all.

Along the way, both women experience heartbreak of various kinds, alongside all the difficulties life throws at us all. Through the lens of their experiences together and apart, Hargrave provides a social commentary on the LGBTQ community through the late 1970s to the 1990s. The characters experience violent homophobia and prejudice alongside the onset of the AIDS epidemic and the accompanying media storm surrounding it. Nevertheless, there are also moments where love and acceptance are found in unexpected places.

On the face of it, most of the main characters are quite dislikeable at times. The only one I didn't get annoyed with was Michel and I wonder if that's because he is Laure's closest friend and the reader largely experiences his behaviour through the lens of her love for him. Nonetheless, Hargrave makes the reader care for these deeply flawed characters and we wanted them to find happiness and peace, whether together or apart.

This is a poignant tale, at times hard to read because we the reader, can see what is happening and the characters cannot. It is beautifully written, but I can see why it wouldn't be for everyone. It is described as a sapphic 'One Day' and I can completely see why. I'm glad I read it because it was so well written, and I would definitely recommend it for people who loved 'One Day', but for me, it's not one I would come back to, because sometimes it's too emotionally difficult to return to a story.