debbyegiles 's review for:

The Summer Before the War by Helen Simonson

3.0

---

I would give this book 3.5 stars -- a full 4 stars for the last third of the book. The first half dragged through a lot of village life and interminable dialog that could have been thinned out by judicious editing. When the story and characters got out from under all that, I began to really enjoy the book. Hard to compare to "Major Pettigrew" since I listened to that on audio (which was a full 5 stars), but this is well worth a read.