Description

**The irresistible follow-up to the hit debut novel Detransition, Baby**

A BOOK TO WATCH IN 2025 IN THE GUARDIAN, IRISH TIMES, ROLLING STONES AND THE BBC

‘As innovative, insightful, funny, and confronting as we’ve come to expect from Peters’ work’ Independent, Best Books to Look Out for in 2025

‘A shining talent’ Stylist Best Books of 2025

‘Hot, heartbreaking and thrillingly victorious’ MIRANDA JULY

‘Potent and surprising and takes no prisoners’ CARMEN MARIA MACHADO

‘Spellbinding. With pathos and wit, Peters explores characters on the brink of self-discovery’ BRIT BENNETT

Deep in the forest, a group of restless lumberjacks working an illegal logging outfit plan a winter dance that some will volunteer to attend as women; the broadest, strongest axeman finds himself caught in a rivalry with a pretty, young jack that culminates in jealousy, betrayal and an astonishing spectacle of transition. Meanwhile, in other times and places, the gender apocalypse is brought about by an unstable ex-girlfriend; an illicit boarding-school romance surfaces intrigue and cruelty; and a Las Vegas party weekend turns dark when a young crossdresser must choose between a thrilling mystery man or a veteran trans woman offering unglamorous sisterhood.

In this quartet of tales, Torrey Peters’ keen eye for the rough edges of desire reveals fresh possibilities. Acidly funny, boldly inventive and breathtaking in scope, Stag Dance provokes and unsettles, inspires and delights.

Publisher Review

Torrey Peters is often describing something that has never been described before and it’s never something minor, it’s something massive that has been missing from our understanding and enjoyment of the world. Stag Dance is hot, heartbreaking and thrillingly victorious — Miranda July, bestselling author of All Fours The stories in Stag Dance are potent and surprising and take no prisoners. How exquisitely Peters writes about the way we move towards ourselves – with the clarity of desire and the agony of resistance — Carmen Maria Machado, author of In the Dream House Spellbinding. With pathos and wit, Peters explores characters who find themselves on the brink of self-discovery while also grappling with the challenge and promise of community. I loved this book — Brit Bennett, bestselling author of The Vanishing Half A brilliant literary kaleidoscope. Peters shatters the familiar in four bold and imaginative tales, each powerful enough to reshape our understanding of transness and where we find it — Nicola Dinan, author of Bellies This is what I want from fiction. It starts at a place of real vulnerability, goes all the way down its own rabbit hole, and ends up potent and strange — Imogen Binnie, author of Nevada I devoured these four tales with obsessive speed. Peters writes about ‘the other’ in such fresh, dark ink, without apology and with the wickedest tongue — Jodie Harsh, author of You Had To Be There Electrifying … The funny yet heart-wrenching title novella, set sometime during the primacy of steam engines and written in the style of a tall tale, may be Peters’ best work yet … Peters explores her characters’ conundrums with striking honesty, revealing how they’re bound by indecision and insecurities from finding happiness, and she exhibits spectacular flexibility with language and form. It’s a marvel * Publishers Weekly, starred review * Praise for Detransition, Baby:

Emotionally generous, richly textured, and deeply intelligent – a vibrant and kaleidoscopic portrait of complicated women and their colliding lives — Claire Lombardo So good I want to scream — Carmen Maria Machado Peters confronts the unruliness of our desires, and our vitality as we struggle within their limits — New Yorker Utterly savage and lacerating while also conveying endlessly expanding compassion — Garth Greenwell