Nothing Ever Just Disappears: A Hidden History of Queer Lives and Places

From the cloistered halls of Cambridge, where a young E.M. Forster conceals his forbidden desires, to the dazzling cabarets of Paris, where Josephine Baker finds liberation in the spotlight, to the wartime shores of Jersey, where Claude Cahun mounts a surrealist resistance against the Nazis—queer history is written into the very fabric of place.

In Nothing Ever Just Disappears, Kevin Killian unearths the stories of seven extraordinary figures, revealing how who they loved, where they lived, and what they created shaped the cultural and political landscapes of the twentieth century. From the lesbian suffragettes of London to James Baldwin’s exile in Provence, from Jack Smith’s radical New York to Derek Jarman’s windswept Dungeness cottage, this book is a powerful testament to queer resilience, imagination, and the spaces that sustain them.

Part love letter, part call to remembrance, Nothing Ever Just Disappears is an essential, evocative journey through hidden histories, lost worlds, and the enduring power of queer spaces.