First Spring Grass Fire - by Rae Spoon (Paperback)

About the Book

Transgendered musician and writer Rae Spoon's book about growing up queer in a strict Pentecostal family.

Book Synopsis

Transgender indie electronica singer-songwriter Rae Spoon has six albums to their credit, including 2012's I Can't Keep All of Our Secrets. This first book by Rae (who uses "they" as a pronoun) is a candid, powerful story about a young person growing up queer in a strict Pentecostal family in rural Canada.

The narrator attends church events and Billy Graham rallies faithfully with their family before discovering the music that becomes their salvation and means of escape. As their father's schizophrenia causes their parents' marriage to unravel, the narrator finds solace and safety in the company of their siblings, in their nascent feelings for a girl at school, and in their growing awareness that they are not the person their parents think they are. With a heart as big as the prairie sky, this is a quietly devastating, heart-wrenching coming-of-age book about escaping dogma, surviving abuse, finding love, and risking everything for acceptance.

Rae Spoon lives in Montreal, Quebec.

Review Quotes

"Rae Spoon is definitely more than a songwriter to swoon for; I predict that First Spring Grass Fire will be a curative for all the heartbroken kids in small towns trying to fight for their right to be who they are. This collection of tender-hearted coming-of-age stories is an impressive literary gem." --Zoe Whittall, author of Holding Still for as Long as Possible

"First Spring Grass Fire will be meaningful to anyone who has struggled to fit in -- and who hasn't? By telling these stories -- of being different, queer, raised in a rigid belief system you didn't choose, trying to be yourself within circumstances you can't control -- Rae Spoon illustrates the triumph in reclaiming and controlling your own identity. This moving collection is a story of what we do to find a place, physical or intangible, that we can call home."--National Post

"A heartbreaking, fictionalized, short-story memoir." --Ms. Magazine

"Transgender indie musician Rae Spoon has six albums under the belt, but this raw and beautifully lyrical new memoir-meets-novel about growing up queer in a strict Pentecostal famly with a schizophrenic father is the best contribution yet." --The Advocate

About the Author

Rae Spoon: Rae Spoon is a transgender musician/writer/workshop facilitator from Calgary, Canada. Rae has been nominated for a Polaris Prize, toured internationally, and released six solo albums. They were recently published in the Arsenal Pulp Press anthology Persistence and composed the instrumental score for the National Film Board film Dead Man.