Thanks for visiting my author’s page. I write non-fiction under my real name, and fiction under the pen-name B.A. Summer. My first novel is “Sole Brethren: If The Shoe Fits”. If you see a book called ‘Callie London’s Vampire Adventures’ by Jane Peyton, it’s another author with the same name, not me!
In my professional life outside of writing I am an alcoholic drinks educator, events host, public speaker, broadcaster, and pub expert. I founded a company called the School of Booze in 2008 offering education, events, and consultancy specializing in alcoholic drinks and their no & low alcohol equivalents.
I was the UK’s first accredited Pommelier (cider sommelier) and Britain’s first Beer Sommelier of the Year. I am also a former Drinks Educator of the Year. My alcohol related published books include: ‘Drink: A Tippler’s Miscellany’, ‘The Philosophy of Gin’ and ‘The Philosophy of Beer’. Click here to buy signed copies.
My latest non-fiction title is ‘The Philosophy of Cocktails’, a distilled history of the cocktail and that book will be published in June 2023. If you want to read more biographical details about me, this link leads to my School of Booze website.
I am fascinated by the cultural history of alcoholic drinks and how they unite people across the world, not just in the modern era but throughout millennia, and I chose a career in drinks so I could combine my professional skills of events production, hosting, public speaking, educating, and writing, with spending time in pubs. There is a reason why every TV and radio soap opera in the UK has a pub where characters meet. Pubs are central to social life in Britain and often act as the town square, the village hall, and heart of the community. I learned that from a young age because my extended family visited pubs for all the important chapters of life – baptism celebrations, wedding receptions, birthday and anniversary parties, funerals, in addition to meeting up in pubs for no reason other than a jollification.
Whenever I am introduced in my professional guise, as founder of the School of Booze, people invariably laugh at the name and say, ‘That’s the sort of school I wish I had gone to’. I usually reply with a joke and say that being a student at the School of Booze means lifelong learning, but you can do your homework at the pub. I mean it! Several of my non-fiction books were researched, pondered about, and drafted in the pub, and one of my most joyous experiences was writing a book called ‘Pub Scene’ (now out of print) which entailed travelling with a photographer, including my sister Helen Peyton, to some of the most stunning pubs in the world.
If you read my novel Sole Brethren: If The Shoe Fits, you may notice that it contains many references to beer, cider, cocktails, and Champagne, but more than anything, that a pub, The Weasel, is a character in its own right. With The Weasel, I devised my ideal pub and if the bank account ever permits, I will make it happen in real life. When it opens you must come for a drink and it will be so perfect you will never want to leave!
A Sequel Is Coming
I am currently working on a sequel to Sole Brethren: If The Shoe Fits, called Sole Brethren: Left To Their Own Devices with the same three central characters. I have no publication date yet but if you want to receive updates please sign up to my mailing list. And if you want to be alerted when The Philosophy of Cocktails is published please sign up to my mailing list.
Jane Peyton, Brighton, UK