The Summer House - Hardcover

Alison McLeay

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0312156669 ISBN 13: 9780312156664

Publisher: St Martins Pr, 1997

Synopsis

Drawn to the dynamic Dunstan family when they arrive in the Lake District to build a mansion, fifteen-year old Chrissie Ascham travels to Venice with them the summer before the Great War and encounters not only a sensual awakening but also tragedy and betrayal.

About this title

From Kirkus Reviews

An agreeable period story in the Masterpiece Theater tradition as an upper-class girl details her encounters with nouveau-riche neighbors in their lakeside mansion where passions flare, parents betray, and true love prevails. Set in the years before and during WW I, the tale is narrated by Chrissie Ascham, who lives with her well-born but scholarly family in the Lake District. The 15-year-old Chrissie, used to frequenting the grounds and boathouse of a neighboring estate, watches as the old house is torn down and replaced with a mansion. She soon meets and befriends the family of the builder, Alfred Dunstan, a domineering self-made manufacturer who wants the house to be a summer home for his gentle wife Letty, grasping daughter Bea, and aloof son Jack. But though no expense is spared, the house will not bring the family the respectability Dunstan desires. Instead, after Chrissie accompanies Bea and Letty to Venice, where they meet handsome 18-year-old Philip Kassel, the family begins to fall apart. Letty and Philip fall in love, and Philip comes to England to see her; but when Dunstan learns of their affair, he brutally threatens Letty, who, heartbroken, parts from Philip. Meanwhile, Chrissie finds herself attracted to handsome Jack, who hates his father. Then when war breaks out, Jack enlists, and Chrissie becomes an ambulance driver on the Western front. The mansion is closed up. After a war injury brings Chrissie home, she almost marries a local doctor, but a surprise meeting at the deserted mansion with a temporarily AWOL Jack, who's learned that Dad is trading with the Germans, rekindles her love for him. Dunstan senior turns nasty, but endings are happy and picturesque- -including a wedding in Venice, no less. Another period piece from McLeay (After Shanghai, 1996, etc.) with, once again, more life and intellectual energy than most. -- Copyright ©1997, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

From Booklist

Narrator Chrissie Ascham's tranquil teenage life in the Lake District changes forever when wealthy Manchester industrialist Alfred Dunstan builds an extravagant summer house nearby for his wife, Letty, and their three children. As construction draws to an end, he proposes that his family, Chrissie, and her father, "the country's leading authority on Renaissance art following the death of Mr. Ruskin," travel to Venice. Here they absorb culture, purchase statuary and ornate gilt chairs, and meet Max Kassel, a pearl merchant, and his son, Philip. After returning to England, Philip and Letty, who is 20 years his senior, fall into a passionate love affair. As events lead up to the beginning of the First World War, Philip enlists when the affair is discovered; Jack, the defiant Dunstan son, rebels against his father's mercenary practice of selling his manufactured goods to all sides. The characters are wrapped in a gossamer film of scandal as forbidden love, stolen pearls, military desertion, and traitorous business activities change all their lives. Jennifer Henderson

About this edition

• Publisher: St Martins Pr
• Publication date: 1997
• ISBN 10: 0312156669
• ISBN 13: 9780312156664
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 309