"Miss Buncle Married" ended with King George V's Silver Jubilee celebrations in 1935. It's now seven years later, Britain is at war, and Barbara is the mother of two small children. For the most part, though, Barbara takes a back seat in this book to the "other" Mrs. Abbott -- Barbara's niece-by-marriage Jeronina "Jerry" Cobbe Abbott, whose husband (the nephew of Barbara's husband Arthur), Sam, is commanding a tank unit in Egypt.
With the help of her former governess Miss Marks (Markie), Jerry has turned her home, Ganthorne Lodge, into a hangout for locally stationed soldiers. She's also rented a cottage on her property to the commander, Colonel Melton, and his daughter, Melanie -- and is trying to matchmake the girl with her brother, Archie, who inherited the Chevis Place estate from their elderly aunt. She also takes in a mysterious paid guest, Jane Watt; as well as Elmie, a runaway girl who previously spent time at Ganthorne with her family as an evacuee from the city.
This was an enjoyable look at the home front in wartime Britain, written while the war was still going on. As usual, the characters, both major and minor, are wonderfully drawn -- especially Markie, who quite possibly steals the show from the title protagonists!
My previous ratings for this book have ranged from 3.5 to 4 stars. Those ratings still stand -- 3.5 stars on StoryGraph, rounded up to 4 stars on Goodreads.
This was Book #30 read to date in 2025 (and Book #3 finished in October), bringing me to 67% of my 2025 Goodreads Reading Challenge goal of 45 books. I am (for the moment, anyway...!) 5 books behind schedule to meet my goal. :) You can find reviews of all my books read to date in 2025 tagged as "2025 books."
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