Witty, heart-warming and profoundly moving, The Summer Before the War is the story of an unexpected heroine and an unassuming village, caught up in an unimaginable war - by the bestselling author of Major Pettigrew's Last Stand

It is late summer in East Sussex, 1914. Amidst the season’s splendour, fiercely independent Beatrice Nash arrives in the coastal town of Rye to fill a teaching position at the local grammar school. There she is taken under the wing of formidable matriarch Agatha Kent, who, along with her charming nephews, tries her best to welcome Beatrice to a place that remains stubbornly resistant to the idea of female teachers. But just as Beatrice comes alive to the beauty of the Sussex landscape, and the colourful characters that populate Rye, the perfect summer is about to end. For the unimaginable is coming – and soon the limits of progress, and the old ways, will be tested as this small town goes to war.

"Funny, barbed, delightfully winsome storytelling … It’s about intelligence, heart, dignity and backbone" - New York Times

"A charming, funny and absorbing debut" - Daily Mail

"A quiet, but ultimately devastating, story of a society invaded by the death and violence from across the Channel. Pinpointing the snobbery and rigidity of a social order that needed a good shake-up, it is gently satiric, but lovingly written. Don’t be put off by the leisurely pace, for at its heart is shrewd observation and a memorable tenderness" - Daily Mail

"There is a nostalgic, warmly seductive afterglow to this evocation of a tight-knit town ruptured yet also reinforced by the onset of war… It quickly becomes an immersive, howlingly emotional read" - Sunday Times

"The novel begins as a comedy of manners in picturesque Rye but deepens into a meditation on loss in the trenches of Flanders. It’s a slow-burn opening with local rivalries, gender politics and burgeoning romances, but the arrival of Belgian refugees shifts the focus to WWI and the physical and emotional wounds of all involved" - Mail on Sunday

"This is PG Wodehouse and Mapp And Lucia territory, sending up hypocrisy and snobbery with a cast of indulged nephews and even an eccentric Aunt Agatha, a stock character of early 20th-century comic novels. There is also a delicious send-up of Henry James in the person of Mr Tillingham who sees his neighbours’ emotional problems as potential material … Simonson’s control of tone is remarkable as she manages to confront serious issues with a gentle satire that never becomes mordant or facetious. I foresee a success as great as that for her debut Major Pettigrew’s Last Stand. An exhilarating new comic voice" - Daily Express

"There’s an edge to this gentle portrait of middle-class society from the start … As the death toll in Europe mounts, the meticulous detail and flair which so beautifully conjures up the atmosphere of the times, is matched by an emotional depth that makes this as harrowing as it is readable" - Sunday Mirror

"At 580 pages, The Summer Before the War is on the long side. But, to paraphrase Jane Austen, it is so well-written that I almost found it too short... My tears had barely dried by the time we sat down together’" - Sussex Life

"This WWI tale charmed our pants off *****" - Heat

"Touching, profound and inspiring" - My Weekly