The Summer King tells stories, exploring the world we inhabit and our relationships with the other. Myth, catastrophe, family, strangers, sex, sport - all feature in this 'fine and fierce first collection' (Gillian Clark). The book contains two sequences: 'Cowarral', about Preston's family farm in the Forbes Valley of NSW, and 'Venery', which was inspired by the collective nouns that first appeared in the Book of St Albans.