When Ellen Carr, daughter of a militant suffragette and raised to be an intellectual, takes a job in Austria as housemother at the Hallendorf School of Music, Drama and the Dance she simply wants to cook beautiful food. What she finds when she reaches Schloss Hallendorf is an eccentrically magical world occupied by wild children, naked Harmony teachers, experimental dancers and a tortoise on wheels. But idyllic as this life appears, outside the castle Hitler's Reich is already casting its menacing shadow over Europe and the persecutions have begun. Through her growing friendship with the mysterious groundsman Marek, Ellen ecounters the dreadful reality of flight from Nazi Germany - and, on the brink of war, discovers a passion that will shape her life. In this witty, touching and above all delightful novel, Eva Ibbotson combines an immensely satisfying love story with a gripping account of the gathering storm of war. A Song for Summer is a joy to read.