August Folly

August Folly is one of Angela Thirkell's standard slice-of-life social comedies set among the rural British lower gentry between the wars. The Tebben family have their little country abode, badly managed by Mrs. Tebben, from which Mr. Tebben commutes to a humble job. Their son, Richard, has just finished the university education for which his parents scrimped and sacrificed but he failed to achieve great glory with it. Richard is spending the summer nominally reading for the law or another profession, but he has little drive. His sister, Margaret, is overlooked and underappreciated, and the investment made in her brother's future precludes any investment in hers. What is the fate of the family?