Beautifully rendered, the shifting inner lives of the characters are subtle and believable and the fresh, sometimes subversive observation is a delight

Miranda France writes skillfully and with a wry touch... That Summer at Hill Farm is a pleasure to read, tempting the reader to wolf it down in one

An arresting writer...France's account of village life conveys a genuine, smoldering anger... Adultery, arson and assault - all come bursting out

Pyromaniac labourers, feuding pensioners and adulterous housewives blot the landscape in Miranda France's entertaining novel, a sort of homage to Cold Comfort Farm, with a dash of Jilly Cooper and The Archers thrown in

With an incredible confidence for a debut novelist, Miranda France changes tack from rural romance to murder mystery...[she] writes with such assurance and humour that she carries us along...through the subtle underpinning of her characterization

Reads like The Archers written by Tolstoy...This debut novel from a well-known travel scribe twists coming-of-age drama with Karenina-esque sensual discovery, and perfectly captures the more Gothic aspects of country life

Miranda France has minutely drawn a farming community, and a broken woman, with excellent skill. She is superb at plucking comedy from tragedy, as well as exhibiting a wry authorial narrative that must owe more than a little to Jane Austen. She manages to square this lightness of tone with a subtle tale full of secrecy, betrayal and fear that keeps you clinging on right to the very end

A convincing depiction of the way in which ordinary lives can be nudged towards quiet tragedy

France writes superbly about the reality of living in the countryside - and the pitch-black ending chills the blood.

It's impossible to avoid comparisons with Stella Gibbons...But Miranda France's debut novel is set in modern-day Sussex and she has drawn on her farming roots to a paint a picture of bucolic pastures.

Immensely clever unearthing of rural life and love

A clear-eyed, wise and subtle debut novel from a novelist to watch. Miranda France´s depiction of a vanishing rural Britain is packed with characters and events that ring coruscatingly true.

There is so much to admire in this novel: authorial eloquence, sly wit and the multi-faceted evocation of a rural community.