Between the Acts by Virginia Woolf

This book gets at the tensions and confusions that swirl beneath the surface of everyday life. The annual village pageant--this year a history of England--hides marital discord. Just as the country's about to enter into war (there are hints, at the edge of the text, which was written in 1941 and set in 1939), the book closes just as Isa and Giles Oliver are about to enter into their own disagreement. Written in Woolf's beautiful style, this book fairly simmers with its keen and wry observations.