Bad Habit by Alana S. Portero

Bad Habit is a novel about a working class trans woman growing up in Madrid and navigating communities and places, death and violence. The unnamed narrator grows up from a young child barely able to understand why she’s drawn to groups of women and to the one trans woman in the neighbourhood, to a teenager living with the weight of hidden first love, and then an adult finding and losing community, and then returning to her original neighbourhood and someone she never knew well enough before. All the while, she grapples with how to live as herself amidst the violence of being working class and different.

Translated from Spanish, this is a lyrical novel and the translation really captures this, moving through scenes in sometimes a hazy way, a remembered way, and also a constructed way, as the protagonist builds up a mythology for herself, her neighbourhood, and the people around her. The narrative focuses around particular moments and scenes in her life, rather than a main story, and it has a coming of age feel, as she discovers forms of sisterhood and community even whilst a lot of her connections with people are fleeting. By the ending, this becomes a memorable concluding vision, bringing with it an idea running throughout the book: that we are and become part of a lineage, that the people and stories that come before are important, and also why we must keep going.

This is a beautiful novel that depict darkness and violence, but also connection and forms of community, and particularly the importance and complexity of finding role models as a trans woman growing up. It questions putting people on a pedestal whilst also acknowledging it can be hard to avoid when you need proof that you have a future and can exist in, or outside of, society.