It is 1936 and the headmistress at Roehampton Secondary School,
pioneer and suffragette Octavia Smith, is steering her pupils
towards success as her exemplary girls' school moves from strength
to strength. But as Europe rumbles towards war, Octavia's drive to
change the world burns as bright as ever and she finds herself
caught up in covert plans to rescue Jewish families from the Nazi
advance in mainland Europe.
Meanwhile, talk of an evacuation of schoolchildren is increasing
and Octavia will have to uproot if she wants to continue her
students' education. Furthermore, Octavia's prize student Lizzie has
quite an interesting father Â- Octavia's old flame Tommy Meriton is
back on the scene, and once again Octavia finds herself torn between
love and dutyÂ
As a new World War strikes closer and closer to home, bringing
challenges and tragedies along the way, Octavia's war is only just beginning.
Beryl Kingston has been a writer since she was seven when she
started producing 'poetry' which, according to her, was very, very
bad. Her first book was published in 1980 and her first novel in 1985.
She lives in West Sussex.
