My new novel, Lake Burntshore, is out now!
A funny and emotionally resonant coming-of-age novel about one summer of momentous social and political change at a Jewish sleepover camp
It’s the summer of 2013 and 21-year-old Ruby, a counselor at Camp Burntshore, can’t wait to supervise a rowdy cabin of 11-year-olds, smoke weed by the fire, and argue about which city make the best bagels. But when Brent, the camp owner’s son, hires Israeli soldiers to deal with a staffing shortfall, Ruby, a committed anti-Zionist, must decide if she’s willing to jeopardize her place at Burntshore to fight Brent over the contentious issues of Jewish belonging and settler colonialism, even as she finds herself falling in love with one of the soldiers, the sweetly handsome Etai.
Soon it becomes clear that the conflict is not just about the camp’s internal divisions but also about Burntshore’s relationship with the neighboring Black Spruce First Nation, strained because of Brent’s larger scheme to buy the Crown land surrounding the lake. As campers swim, go canoe tripping, and stage an over-the-top musical, Ruby has to contend with her feelings for Etai while simultaneously trying to save her beloved camp from greed and colonialism. A social satire, romance, and political commentary all in one, Lake Burntshore celebrates the contemporary Jewish world through its most iconic symbol — the often idyllic yet always dramatic summer camp.
Available now at ECW Press, bookshop.org if you're in America, and wherever you get your books!
Advanced Praise:
“Funny, frank, and sexy, Lake Burntshore is a richly felt examination of the Jewish diaspora. Aaron Kreuter’s storytelling will transport you to your coziest, most carefree memories while also holding up a mirror to the adult you’ve become. This story really is a summer to remember.” — Gabe Liedman, writer and comedian
“Lake Burntshore is a summer camp story like no other. Ambitious in theme and impressively effective in narrative, this novel brilliantly unpacks the extensive, harmful impacts of colonialism with nuance and care. From Palestine to Ontario cottage country, Aaron Kreuter deftly gives agency to, and celebrates the humanity of, the people of the land. To anyone in a diaspora that’s struggled under oppression for generations, this story hits very close to home. By honouring the land and the people fighting for recognition and justice, Lake Burntshore is both timely and timeless.” — Waubgeshig Rice, author of Moon of the Crusted Snow
"Lake Burntshore hooks you from the beginning. Aaron Kreuter is unafraid to examine our views of displacement and genocide and our relationship with the land. A must-read!” — Christina Wong, author of Denison Avenue
Lake Burntshore Related Media:
Rubble Children is Also Out Now!
In seven-and-a-half interlinked stories, Aaron Kreuter’s Rubble Children tackles Jewish belonging, settler colonialism, Zionism and anti-Zionism, love requited and unrequited, and cannabis culture, all drenched in suburban wonder and dread. Sometimes realist, often satirical, and with a dash of the speculative, the book introduces readers to a startling world of character and place, a world which orbits Kol B'Seder, a fictional Reform synagogue in the Toronto suburb of Thornhill. In these stories, the locked basement room in the home of the synagogue’s de facto patriarch opens onto a life-altering windfall. A retiree walks the suburban streets, wracked with uncertainty whether he should vote to include a Palestinian scholar in Kol B’Seder’s upcoming speaker series. Teens stay up all night at a youth “shul-in,” navigating hormones, drugs, and nightmares of the third temple. Reliving the same day over and over again, a couple reckons with both the end of their relationship and a series of ever-changing permutations of Israel/Palestine. In the story that gives the collection its name, a group of Jewish girls obsessed with the Holocaust discover that they are far from the only people who live in the rubble of history. Engaging, funny, dark, surprising, Rubble Children is a scream of Jewish rage, a smoky exhalation of Jewish joy, a vivid dream of better worlds.
