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Loading... The Summer Before the Warby Helen Simonson
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Sign up for LibraryThing to find out whether you'll like this book. No current Talk conversations about this book. The best parts of this novel is the satire spoken not in jest but earnestly “ I can’t wait to tour the model trench” said Eleanor” Beatrice Nash told me they have bookshelves and willow furniture and that they read poetry every night before taps”. !!! This novel also shows the awful attitude towards women at this time “Spinsters aren’t suppose to enjoy themselves said Daniel. I think they live to be useful.” Or this one “Compounding lack of funds with intelligence, she makes herself unmarriageable.” The constrictions on women are a theme in this novel. Beatrice, our main character, helped her father live as a writer yet when he died he put his estate” in trust” not allowing her to manage it alone. And poor Celeste, the Belgian refugee, agrees to go to a convent as that is demanded by her father. Social etiquette, gossip and a person’s station in life are also recurring themes. The last part of the novel is about the war itself and Hugh and Daniel, Harry and Snout in France. Here too rank and protocol determine outcomes like for poor Snout. And in the end, after death has claimed many in war one is left to wonder, why is all that important when we are all just people who love and mourn I read somewhere that this book was great for people who missed Downton Abbey and I think that was a good tip. I'm always pleased with a smart, independent woman and Beatrice was no different. I enjoyed the goings on of the small English town in the run up to WWI. Town politics, romance, scandal, war.....it's all here.
Now Simonson is back with The Summer Before the War, a gentle comedy of provincial manners that rivals her first in the charm department...In The Summer Before the War, the novelist's attention to sensory detail is lovely, simple yet evocative.... Droll dialogue dominates, with gentle zingers regularly applied. There are the time-tested markers of small town life: a parade, a harvest festival, country dances....The contrast between pastoral peace and the violent chaos of war is what gives this novel its heft; Rather than making characters sympathetic, this virtuous quirk prevents the reader from discovering the mild contradictions in human nature. And that is what we travel to social-comedy land to enjoy. AwardsDistinctionsNotable Lists
Fiction.
Literature.
Historical Fiction.
HTML:NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • “A novel to cure your Downton Abbey withdrawal . . . a delightful story about nontraditional romantic relationships, class snobbery and the everybody-knows-everybody complications of living in a small community.”—The Washington Post The bestselling author of Major Pettigrew’s Last Stand returns with a breathtaking novel of love on the eve of World War I that reaches far beyond the small English town in which it is set. NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY THE WASHINGTON POST AND NPR East Sussex, 1914. It is the end of England’s brief Edwardian summer, and everyone agrees that the weather has never been so beautiful. Hugh Grange, down from his medical studies, is visiting his Aunt Agatha, who lives with her husband in the small, idyllic coastal town of Rye. Agatha’s husband works in the Foreign Office, and she is certain he will ensure that the recent saber rattling over the Balkans won’t come to anything. And Agatha has more immediate concerns; she has just risked her carefully built reputation by pushing for the appointment of a woman to replace the Latin master. When Beatrice Nash arrives with one trunk and several large crates of books, it is clear she is significantly more freethinking—and attractive—than anyone believes a Latin teacher should be. For her part, mourning the death of her beloved father, who has left her penniless, Beatrice simply wants to be left alone to pursue her teaching and writing. But just as Beatrice comes alive to the beauty of the Sussex landscape and the colorful characters who populate Rye, the perfect summer is about to end. For despite Agatha’s reassurances, the unimaginable is coming. Soon the limits of progress, and the old ways, will be tested as this small Sussex town and its inhabitants go to war. Praise for The Summer Before the War “What begins as a study of a small-town society becomes a compelling account of war and its aftermath.”—Woman’s Day “This witty character study of how a small English town reacts to the 1914 arrival of its first female teacher offers gentle humor wrapped in a hauntingly detailed story.”—Good Housekeeping “Perfect for readers in a post–Downton Abbey slump . . . The gently teasing banter between two kindred spirits edging slowly into love is as delicately crafted as a bone-china teacup. . . . More than a high-toned romantic reverie for Anglophiles—though it serves the latter purpose, too.”—The Seattle Times. No library descriptions found.
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Google Books — Loading... GenresMelvil Decimal System (DDC)813.6Literature English (North America) American fiction 21st CenturyLC ClassificationRatingAverage:
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Throughout the book my main thought was.... why hasn't PBS/ BBC made this a movie/ mini series yet? Also there would be ways to write a sequel. I would happily read that as well. ( )