Set in Lisbon and its suburbs, Hard Summer is a collection of poems exploring the intricacies of memory and its complex relationship to place. Written as a fragmented memoir, the poems investigate what it means to reconcile the loss and joy of growing up, leaning on cinematic perspective and language to honour a moment in time. Hard Summer looks at the interaction between truth, feeling and memory, bringing the reader along through dull summer days and cyclical conversations, to celebratory moments and the solemn walk home.
TESTIMONIALS
Francisca Matos sculpts a collection from the oft-romanticized and brutally honest experience of adolescence—in her work we find circuses, video games, hot nights where friends cut their hair together and find their hands sticky from oranges. Matos’ excavation of a young girl navigating suburbia is an essential understanding of the deep root of nostalgia, and the fear of the silence that accompanies or follows it. Who has "the right to wear grief" is a question asked often in this text, and Matos weaves the threads into a beautiful coat of poetry that anyone would be remiss not to pick up from a shelf. – GABRIELLE GRACE HOGAN
This is a teen movie narrated by the girl standing in the background watching it all unfold, and by that I mean, it's my favourite movie. I want to give Hard Summer to all of my girls. I want to give Hard Summer to my little sister. This book is a stunning celebration of the darkness of girlhood and the patience required to grow up. Francisca Matos is a name you need to remember. – LUCY K. SHAW
My friends and I, we're nice kids, / good kids good at being kids, / we show our love by not saying a word." Matos playfully and vividly pays tribute to innocence and experience in this striking debut. Days marked by dirty grass, ice cream, and sleepovers are revealed to be less an emblem of a simpler time than moments of complex emotional risk and stake in their own right. Vistas glimpsed from cars and memories of friendships tumble from the past to colour the present as Matos skilfully captures the great ambivalence of youth. "Sometimes I wish I could run until the feeling leaves me, / other times I wish I could run towards everyone." - MAYA C. POPA
With her keen eye trained on the experience of suburban girlhood, Francisca Matos has written a book of poems that enacts the great, complicated shifts in consciousness that form and continue to shape the self in adolescence and beyond. Carefully observed and intimately rendered, I couldn’t help but read this book in one gulp. A new fan, I am hungry for more. – CARRIE FOUNTAIN
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Originally from Lisbon, Portugal, Francisca has an MA in Creative Writing at Goldsmiths, University of London. Her work has been published in Feels zine, Profound Experience of Earth and Vagabond City. Just prior to the release of her debut collection Hard Summer, Francisca was offered an MFA fellowship at Sarah Lawrence College in New York, where she now resides.
Set in Lisbon and its suburbs, Hard Summer is a collection of poems exploring the intricacies of memory and its complex relationship to place. Written as a fragmented memoir, the poems investigate what it means to reconcile the loss and joy of growing up, leaning on cinematic perspective and language to honour a moment in time. Hard Summer looks at the interaction between truth, feeling and memory, bringing the reader along through dull summer days and cyclical conversations, to celebratory moments and the solemn walk home.
TESTIMONIALS
Francisca Matos sculpts a collection from the oft-romanticized and brutally honest experience of adolescence—in her work we find circuses, video games, hot nights where friends cut their hair together and find their hands sticky from oranges. Matos’ excavation of a young girl navigating suburbia is an essential understanding of the deep root of nostalgia, and the fear of the silence that accompanies or follows it. Who has "the right to wear grief" is a question asked often in this text, and Matos weaves the threads into a beautiful coat of poetry that anyone would be remiss not to pick up from a shelf. – GABRIELLE GRACE HOGAN
This is a teen movie narrated by the girl standing in the background watching it all unfold, and by that I mean, it's my favourite movie. I want to give Hard Summer to all of my girls. I want to give Hard Summer to my little sister. This book is a stunning celebration of the darkness of girlhood and the patience required to grow up. Francisca Matos is a name you need to remember. – LUCY K. SHAW
My friends and I, we're nice kids, / good kids good at being kids, / we show our love by not saying a word." Matos playfully and vividly pays tribute to innocence and experience in this striking debut. Days marked by dirty grass, ice cream, and sleepovers are revealed to be less an emblem of a simpler time than moments of complex emotional risk and stake in their own right. Vistas glimpsed from cars and memories of friendships tumble from the past to colour the present as Matos skilfully captures the great ambivalence of youth. "Sometimes I wish I could run until the feeling leaves me, / other times I wish I could run towards everyone." - MAYA C. POPA
With her keen eye trained on the experience of suburban girlhood, Francisca Matos has written a book of poems that enacts the great, complicated shifts in consciousness that form and continue to shape the self in adolescence and beyond. Carefully observed and intimately rendered, I couldn’t help but read this book in one gulp. A new fan, I am hungry for more. – CARRIE FOUNTAIN
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Originally from Lisbon, Portugal, Francisca has an MA in Creative Writing at Goldsmiths, University of London. Her work has been published in Feels zine, Profound Experience of Earth and Vagabond City. Just prior to the release of her debut collection Hard Summer, Francisca was offered an MFA fellowship at Sarah Lawrence College in New York, where she now resides.
