LOVE IN EXILE

Uncommonly wise and honest Love in Exile flooded me with a sense of continuity and hope A masterpiece from start to finish Maggie Nelson We ache for love but love eludes us Out of this crisis comes so much of what it means to be humanShon Faye grew up quietly obsessed with the feeling that love was not for her Not just romantic love the secret fear of her own unworthiness penetrated every aspect and corner of her life It was a fear that would erupt in destructive counterfeit versions of the real love she craved addictions and short lived romances that were either euphoric and fantastical or excruciatingly painful and unhinged often both Faye s experience of the world as a trans woman who grew up visibly queer exacerbated her fears But as she confronted her damaging ideas about love and lovelessness she came to realize that this sense of exclusion is symptomatic of a much larger problem in our culture Love she argues is as much a collective question as a personal one Yet our collective ideals of love have developed in a society which is itself profoundly sick and loveless in which consumer capitalism sells us ever new engrossing fantasies of becoming more loved or lovable In this highly politicized terrain boundaries are purposefully drawn t