We’re thrilled to be welcoming Juno Roche back to the shop to discuss A WORKING-CLASS FAMILY AGES BADLY – their radically honest and uplifting memoir about defying death and learning to live. Juno will be in conversation with Stu Hennigan (Ghost Signs).

About the book:

Juno Roche was born into a working-class family in London in the ’60s, who dabbled in minor criminality. For their father, violence and love lived together; for their mother, addiction was the only way to survive. School was a respite, but shortly after beginning their university course, Juno was diagnosed with HIV, then a death sentence.

Juno is a survivor; they outlived their diagnosis, got a degree and became an artist. But however hard you try to take the kid out of the family, some scars go too deep; trying to run from AIDS and their childhood threw Juno into dark years of serious drug addiction, addiction often financed by sex work.

Running from home eventually took Juno across the sea to a tiny village in Spain, surrounded by mountains. Only once they found a quiet little house with an olive tree in the garden did Juno start to wonder if they had run too far, and whether they have really been searching for a family all along.

In an incredibly honest and brave book, Juno takes us through the moments of their life: mum sending Christmas cards containing Valium, drug withdrawal on a River Nile cruise, overcoming their father’s violence and finding their dream house in Spain. Showing immense resilience, Juno’s memoir is a book about what it means to stay alive.

Emotional, tragic and incredibly funny, A Working-Class Family Ages Badly is an unforgettable must-have memoir for anyone who loves Educated, Deborah Levy and Motherwell.

About the author:

Juno Roche is a writer and campaigner whose work around class, gender, sexuality and trans lives has been funded by the likes of The Paul Hamlyn Foundation and described as ‘provocative and innovative’. Juno studied Fine Art and Philosophy at Brighton, and English Literature at Sussex, and writes for a wide range of publications including Bitch magazine, Dazed, Vice, Broadly, Cosmopolitan, the i, The Independent, i-D, the Tate magazine and Refinery29. They are the author of four books: Queer Sex, Trans Power, Gender Explorers and their memoir, A Working-Class Family Ages Badly.

Doors: 18.30, event starts: 18.45

Tickets are £3.00 or free when pre-ordering a copy of the book. A WORKING-CLASS FAMILY AGES BADLY will also be available to purchase on the night and Juno will be signing copies after the talk. If you would like a signed copy but cannot make the event, please contact us on 0161 274 3331 or manchester@blackwell.co.uk and we can arrange this for you.