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demottar 's review for:
The Summer Before the War
by Helen Simonson
Somehow, this book was even more perfect the second time around. The first half to two-thirds of the book focuses on the innocence, rigidity, and smallness of life up until the summer before WWI and it is a slower read that works to characterize the small town of Rye and it’s occupants. However, the payoff is so worth the wait, as the second half of the book is riveting, bittersweet, and powerful. I look forward to reading this again someday and will continue to recommend it!
***
This book was everything I didn't know I wanted to read this month, and I loved every minute I spent with it. The Summer Before the War is certainly a novel of manners, but it's also much more than that. It's a novel about lost innocence, the growing pains of social change, friendship, the strength of family ties, and, of course, like all proper country novels, romantic love.
Helen Simonson writes her characters with clarity and humor, and while some of them may be a little more modern in their thinking than their environment would suggest, I truly did not care; I never wanted to stop reading about them. (In fact, I think I appreciated the novel more for its timeliness in addressing gender roles and refugee crises, during WWI.)
Simonson's dialogue is very clever and often cuts right to the truth of the matter. There is a bit of a honeysuckle glaze over the novel, but I never lost focus of the sobering fact that WWI and all of its unimaginable horrors were approaching swiftly and steadily. When it arrives, it’s horrible, breathtaking, and powerful.
Some Favorite quotes:
“'I avoid the papers altogether,' said Daniel. 'I'm pretty sure wars would be shorter if we weren't all so eager to read about them.'”
"He did not think the present company would welcome a debate on such questions--for he had no doubt that spirited debate was the first casualty of any war."
“Compounding lack of funds with intelligence, she makes herself unmarriageable.”
“…Beatrice recognized the slow steps and bent back of the fishmonger’s wife, whose son had been among those lost in the first battles of the Expeditionary Force… [H]ow much excited interest and respect the town had showered upon them in the earliest weeks… Now the woman seemed to have aged many years, and business was slower in the shop as many townspeople gave in to the callow instinct to avoid the grieving parents.”
***
This book was everything I didn't know I wanted to read this month, and I loved every minute I spent with it. The Summer Before the War is certainly a novel of manners, but it's also much more than that. It's a novel about lost innocence, the growing pains of social change, friendship, the strength of family ties, and, of course, like all proper country novels, romantic love.
Helen Simonson writes her characters with clarity and humor, and while some of them may be a little more modern in their thinking than their environment would suggest, I truly did not care; I never wanted to stop reading about them. (In fact, I think I appreciated the novel more for its timeliness in addressing gender roles and refugee crises, during WWI.)
Simonson's dialogue is very clever and often cuts right to the truth of the matter. There is a bit of a honeysuckle glaze over the novel, but I never lost focus of the sobering fact that WWI and all of its unimaginable horrors were approaching swiftly and steadily.
Spoiler
I certainly felt Agatha's crushing fear and sense of powerlessness in sending her two nephews off to war.Some Favorite quotes:
“'I avoid the papers altogether,' said Daniel. 'I'm pretty sure wars would be shorter if we weren't all so eager to read about them.'”
"He did not think the present company would welcome a debate on such questions--for he had no doubt that spirited debate was the first casualty of any war."
“Compounding lack of funds with intelligence, she makes herself unmarriageable.”
“…Beatrice recognized the slow steps and bent back of the fishmonger’s wife, whose son had been among those lost in the first battles of the Expeditionary Force… [H]ow much excited interest and respect the town had showered upon them in the earliest weeks… Now the woman seemed to have aged many years, and business was slower in the shop as many townspeople gave in to the callow instinct to avoid the grieving parents.”