Features

End-of-the-Year Contest 2016

Congratulations to the winners of our 2016 End-of-the-Year Contest! One Grand Prize winner received all 40 of Carol Fitzgerald's Bookreporter.com Bets On picks from 2016, while eight others won a selection of five of these titles. You can see all the winners below, along with 2016's Bets On selections.

Spring Preview 2016

The arrival of spring signals the end of our Spring Preview contests. Many thanks to all who entered --- and a big congratulations to all our winners! You can see the winners here, and below are the books that we believe you’ll be talking about over the next few months.

Helen Simonson, author of The Summer Before the War

East Sussex, 1914. Hugh Grange, down from his medical studies, is visiting his Aunt Agatha, who has just risked her carefully built reputation by pushing for the appointment of a woman to replace the Latin master. But just as Beatrice Nash, the teacher, 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.

The Summer Before the War by Helen Simonson

April 2016

THE SUMMER BEFORE THE WAR by Helen Simonson takes place during the summer before World War I. Set in East Sussex (where Helen was raised) in 1914, Beatrice Nash has arrived in town to teach. Agatha Kent, who has lobbied for her tenure there, is distressed to learn that Beatrice is not some old schoolmarm type, but rather a pretty and bright young woman. Beatrice is clearly saddened by the death of her father and seems to be viewing her time in Sussex as an opportunity to read, escape, and be alone with her books and her bicycle. She quickly acclimates to the small town, but not without moments where faux pas are made as she learns the idiosyncrasies of the folks in the town.

Week of February 20, 2017

Paperback releases for the week of February 20th include Kathleen Grissom's GLORY OVER EVERYTHING, a heart-racing story about a man’s treacherous journey through the twists and turns of the Underground Railroad on a mission to save the boy he swore to protect; THREE SISTERS, THREE QUEENS by Philippa Gregory, the little-known story of three Tudor women who are united in sisterhood and yet compelled to be rivals when they fulfill their destinies as queens; THE SUMMER BEFORE THE WAR by Helen Simonson, 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; and THE LEGENDS CLUB, the riveting inside story of college basketball's fiercest rivalry among three coaching legends --- University of North Carolina's Dean Smith, Duke's Mike Krzyzewski, and North Carolina State's Jim Valvano --- from award-winning author and sportswriter John Feinstein.

You are here:

Features

Helen Simonson

Find a Book