Gail Godwin has been quite a prolific writer since the 1970s, and a successful one, but this is the first I've read. Helen remembers the summer in which she turned eleven, right at the end of World War Two. Her father is away working on a secret war project, so Helen is looked after by Flora, 22, her deceased mother's cousin. Helen is crabby, supercilious and generally uncooperative, Flora is sunny, happy and relentlessly helpful. Not much happens, but the novel has an air of tension and doom; the reader knows something bad is eventually going to happen, and sure enough, it does. This is a haunting book about regret and fate, and the lessons of childhood. I felt the conclusion was a little rushed, and I would have liked a little more evidence that Helen did gain some knowledge of herself - we don't see enough of her as an adult to know this - but it is still a memorable novel.