Reviews

I was born in 1981, the same year an article about a new "gay cancer" was published, signaling the start of the HIV/AIDS pandemic. By the time I was old enough to really understand what AIDS was, the YM magazines I read were already full of articles about pretty blonde girls living with the disease, detailed info about condom use, and the oft-repeated reminder that, "anyone can get AIDS." It wasn't until later that I realized that AIDS originated in the gay community, and it wasn't until MUCH later that I understood exactly how much it decimated that community during the '80s and '90s, and how much discrimination early AIDS patients faced.

This book brings into stark relief the hardships endured by those touched by AIDS during the disease's first decade. France refers to AIDS as a plague, and while that might seem a bit melodramatic at first, after several hundred pages of deaths and suffering, that wording becomes undeniable. France humanizes the crisis by including both his own experiences as a gay man living in New York during the height of the epidemic, and those of the scientists, activists, politicians, and journalists working on AIDS, whose personalities are clearly shown, warts and all.

While the coverage of the New York activist/scientific scene can only be described as exhaustive, France goes into much less detail when talking about other AIDS hot spots like San Francisco and Africa. The last half of the the book started to get a bit bogged down by the huge cast of chemicals and characters, and by France's verbatim transcripts of ACT UP meetings and the petty squabbles between rival groups, but I suppose there's no way to avoid that.

Good choice for fans of science writing and GLBTQ history.

More...