Juno Roche - Roam: A Search for Happiness

2023, English, Juno Roche,

Full title: "Roam: A Search for Happiness" by Juno Roche.

Juno Roche’s memoir Roam: A Search for Happiness is a book that stays with you long after you close its final page. It is at once a personal survival story, a sharp social observation, and a reflection on what it means to keep searching for belonging when life seems determined to push you to the margins. For readers who loved memoirs such as Educated by Tara Westover, Deborah Levy’s deeply introspective works, or Motherwell by Deborah Orr, Roam delivers an equally unforgettable blend of heartbreak, humor, and resilience.

 

Born into a working-class London family in the sixties, Juno grew up in an environment where contradictions defined daily life: for their father, violence and love coexisted, while their mother used addiction as her method of survival. School offered a fleeting sense of refuge, but life soon turned upside down. Shortly after beginning university, Juno was diagnosed with HIV, a diagnosis that in the eighties was essentially a death sentence. Yet Juno is still here. They outlived the dire expectations, earned a degree, and pursued art. But survival came at a cost. Some scars ran deeper than others, and attempts to escape the past, both childhood trauma and the looming specter of AIDS, led Juno into years of heavy drug addiction, often funded through sex work. Addiction, like a shadow, followed them across countries and relationships, leaving them with moments of tragedy and absurdity in equal measure.

 

Roam captures these years unflinchingly: Christmas cards from Mum padded with Valium, detoxing during a cruise on the River Nile, and navigating both familial violence and chosen family in queer and trans communities. And yet, the memoir never settles for despair. It is also about beauty, the dream house in Spain with an olive tree in the garden, the mountains that surrounded Juno’s chosen village, and the persistent, stubborn yearning for happiness. The book asks a quiet but insistent question: what is home? For Juno, it is not necessarily a physical place, but rather the discovery of self-worth and safety after a life shaped by instability. Their eventual move to a remote Spanish village brought the paradox into sharp relief: in finding peace and isolation, Juno also had to ask whether they had run too far, and whether what they had always been seeking was not escape, but family.

Critics and fellow authors have praised Roam for its honesty and originality. Travis Alabanza called it “full of heart, wit and charm”, while Paul Burston described it as so gripping that he had to slow himself down just to savor the writing. Tom Rasmussen emphasized Juno’s rare ability to combine warmth with confrontation, while CN Lester highlighted its compassionate and dreamlike qualities. For novelist Irenosen Okojie, the book is so powerful it “should be read by everyone.” What makes Roam truly remarkable is the voice. Juno writes with scathing honesty, but also with wit, tenderness, and even humor, finding space for laughter amid trauma. As Amelia Abraham puts it, Juno has “always been a literary voice like no one else, scathingly honest and endlessly expansive.” That expansiveness, refusing to be confined by identity, illness, or pain, is what gives Roam its unforgettable strength.

 

For those who wish to understand more about the person behind the book, the interview Juno gave to Heroines of My Life in 2017 offers valuable insight. In that conversation, Juno reflected on their journey as a trans writer and activist, sharing glimpses of both their challenges and their unwavering belief in authenticity. Reading that interview alongside Roam enriches the experience, reminding us that Juno’s story is not only literary but also deeply human, an ongoing act of survival and defiance. At its heart, Roam: A Search for Happiness is about staying alive when life insists otherwise. It is about navigating the jagged terrain of violence, addiction, illness, and shame, and still choosing to pursue beauty, connection, and joy. Juno Roche’s memoir is emotional, tragic, and incredibly funny, often in the same breath. More than just a personal story, it is an invitation to readers: to roam, to seek, and to never stop searching for happiness, no matter how elusive it may seem.

Available via Amazon
Photo via Heroines of My Life

 

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