JANE SUMMER
Books
An extensive excerpt of Ms. Summer's Erebus appears in the just released Devouring the Green: Fear of a Human Planet poetry anthology.
Additional contributors include Maureen Seaton, Marge Piercy, Bill Knott, Tracy K. Smith, John Skoyles, Maggie Cleveland (a Goddard MFA alum!) and other astonishing writers the general public most has likely never heard of. Such is the fate of poets.
"Organized around a series of questions drawing attention to how the 21st century has complicated our experiences of nature, the body, and human activity, Devouring the Green pushes an exciting range of contemporary poets to resist nostalgic, simplified notions of our human place in the world and, rather, to focus unflinchingly on the many ways we entangle with—and, by our presence, irrevocably change—the world around us. The poems gathered here are alternately visionary, wry, celebratory, angry, elegiac, and apocalyptic—dizzyingly broad in their scope and, above all else, timely. This is a wonderfully unique, ambitious, and challenging anthology." –Wayne Miller, author of The City, Our City
TWO of Ms. Summer's short stories appear in recent and highly praised anthologies.
"Mrs. Chretien Listened to Elgar," originally published in Oregon East, is anthologized in Lost Orchard (SUNY Press, 2015), a literary anthology comprised of contributions from former members of the Kirkland College community, the last established women’s college in the United States. Ms. Summer's story is the shattering tale of a woman's attempt to cope with the suicide of her preteen daughter.
For more information: http://www.sunypress.edu/p-5843-lost-orchard.aspx
"Peaceful Village," Ms. Summer's immersive dystopian tale of children trying to rebuild the world, taps her familiar motifs. It was chosen for inclusion in The Masters Review Volume II, by the inimitible A.M. Homes.
For more information: https://mastersreview.com/shop/
The Silk Road (Alyson, 2000), nominated for a Ferro-Grumley for Fiction (with Eileen Myles and Sarah Waters), reflects Ms. Summer's debut as a master of language and plot in a coming-of-age novel set in the transitional late 60s-early 70s.
"Jane Summer brilliantly pinpoints that deranged phase between girlhood and womanhood (which some of us never grow out of)." Time Out
"[The] sweetness of first love is evoked with a skill that crosses gender lines. . . . Sensuous language, spot-on period detail, and tongue-in-cheek humor." Publishers Weekly
"In her first novel, the author captures perfectly the confusion and turmoil of teenage self-discovery." Library Journal
"nothing short of brilliant" Outlooks
"The Silk Road is a funny, heartrending, lovely novel, one that will take you back to a time you are probably still astonished you survived. Don't miss it." Bay Area Reporter
"Stylish, painful, and hilarious, The SIlk Road captures the true queerness of adolescence." Emma Donoghue, author of Room
"a classic, universal coming-of-age tale . . . a wonderful book." Gay People's Chronicle
"This captivating novel may be one of the coolest books of the year." Mode
NEW BY
JANE
SUMMER
Erebus, Ms. Summer's book-length hybrid poem, tells the harrowing story of the 1979 crash of Air New Zealand's flight 901 in Antarctica and of the friendship impacted by the disaster.
“. . . astounding . . . gorgeous . . . transcendent. . . I was in constant awe at Erebus’s sheer originality. I felt like I was reading a book about a new way to tell time.” –Michael Klein, author of When I Was a Twin
"This book is about a friend and loss, and it is also about poetry itself: perhaps one of the only tools available to map grief when corporate and government cover-up, an inquest record number, missing archival evidence, and silence are the public coordinates offered."
–Jill Magi, author of Labor
For more information: www.siblingrivalrypress.com
Ms. Summer's edition of Not the Only One (Alyson, 2004) was among the New York Public Library's Notable "Books for the Teen Age 2005."
A collection of gay-themed or gay-subtextual short stories edited by Ms. Summer for high school kids, Not the Only One includes stories by Leslea Newman (Heather Has Two Mommies), Gregory Maguire (Wicked), Claire McNab (Carol Ashton mysteries) and others. Some stories are directly about coming out while others simply see the world through the eyes of gay characters.