Everyone remembered the summer of '39 as golden and strange. Golden because it was the driest on record; strange because people were burrowing holes and roofing them with iron. Waiting for the bombs…

In the Hampshire town of Markham, Georgia Kennedy wakes on her husband's last day in Civvy Street and feels elated. Conventionally married to the pompous Hugh, she discovers liberation during the war. Like other women, she embraces the camaraderie previously held back by gender and class. For Georgia, for rich, spoiled Eve, for salt-of-the-earth Dolly, life will never be the same again.