The Summer Between

The Summer Between is a poignant and introspective novel that is at times both funny and heartbreaking and that seamlessly fuses universal themes of a boy’s experiences as he embarks upon adolescence with the growing realisation that he is different against the backdrop of the local colour of rural eastern Ontario in the late 1960s. In this respect, Mr. Binks offers the reader an incredibly thoughtful, thought-provoking and bittersweet story of a boy coming of age and at the same time a distinct slice of period Canadiana. By all accounts The Summer Between is an exceptionally written novel that should not to be missed.-Indigene, Three Dollar Bill ReviewsThere are no lapses worth mentioning in this deftly structured and perfectly inflected story… We watch him revel in love’s beginning and absorb the knowledge of its inevitable change. What a wonderful fictional debut.-Jim Bartley, XtraLost in the torrent of fat, glitzy-covered commercial books that flood your favourite bookstore are quiet, charming novels like this one from Ontario’s Andrew Binks. It’s so tautly written and so direct in its narration, it makes the average bestseller seem flabby. … The Summer Between succeeds as a low-key account of a boy testing his instincts and his upbringing in a natural but ever-more-complicated world.-Dave Williamson, Prairie Fire

Andrew Binks has worked, written, acted and taught across the globe, from Fringe Festival solo shows, to the Stratford Festival, to Da Vinci’s Inquest, to modelling in Paris, to teaching business English in Japan. Binks holds a BA in Drama from Queen’s University and an MFA in Creative Writing from the University of British Columbia. A finalist in the Writers’ Union of Canada Short Prose Contest and This Magazine’s Great Canadian Literary Hunt, Binks’ fiction, non-fiction, and poetry has appeared in Galleon, Prism International, Harrington Gay Men’s Literary Quarterly, Bent Magazine, the Globe and Mail, Xtra, Queen’s Alumni Review, Quill’s lust issue, and the Velvet Avalanche poetry anthology. He recently spoke on behalf of UBC at the Association of Writers and Writing Programs conference in New York City on the challenges and benefits of multi-genre creative writing programs. After fifteen years in Vancouver, he has returned to Ontario. This is Binks’ first novel.