Sleepaway: Writings on Summer Camp

By Eric Simonoff

Margaret Atwood tells of a girl swallowed up by the woods and lost forever. Mark Oppenheimer experiences leftist utopia in a nature camp. David Sedaris avoids having a bowel movement for a month. ZZ... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1594480885
• ISBN13: 9781594480881
• Release Date: June 2005
• Publisher: Riverhead Trade
• Length: 320 Pages
• Weight: 0.65 lbs.
• Dimensions: 7.8" x 0.9" x 5.3"
• Age Range: 18 years and up
• Grade Range: Grade 12 and higher

Customer Reviews

Great read for parents

It's bittersweet to view the campfire nights of childhood with adult sensibilities. That's the poignancy of Eric Simonoff's Sleepaway. This compilation had me reminiscing about time spent at camp Magruder on the Oregon coast. The book was a terrific escape from our bleak mid-winter. It's filled with essays by literary heavy-hitters. A raw Margaret Atwood story rips into the unbearable pain of adolescence - (those of us deep in the throws of teenage self-absorbson were oblivious to the tragic figures loitering by the lakeside.) A hilarious ZZ Packer piece had me laughing so hard, I woke up my husband. Eric's introduction is sharp and funny. I wanted to hear more about, "The awkwardly named Josef and Betty Harlam Camp in rural Kunkletown." From the start, the introspective Sharon Olds poem places us mentally - as parents now, not kids anymore. Sleepway is a great read - or more aptly, it's a must read for parents ready to send their kids off to camp this summer. (Some of the applications are due already?)

Great Read

The kind of book everyone can relate to. There are stories that take you back to camp or put there if you never had the experience. The friendships that last a life time in our memories are portrayed here in Sleepaway. This is the collection of camp stories that helps us remember how we grew up at away from home in the summer.

For those who went to summer camp... and those who didn't

To appreciate the collection of stories and essays in this book, you don't need to be familiar with life in the tents and canoes of the Poconos, but only with life itself. From old favorites like Margaret Atwood and Ursula Le Guin to lesser-known names like Josh Lambert and Terry Galloway, the authors bring their unique perspectives to an institution that stands in as a most natural microcosm of American life. While David Sedaris is hysterical as usual, it's the more serious pieces, like Atwood's tale of a life forever haunted by a childhood incident and Lambert's story of forbidden love -- and perhaps why such love should be forbidden -- that make the collection shine.