Book excerpt: Pre-order Victory for Ambridge, the brilliant new novel in The Archers series, coming in paperback in 2025. Celebrating the 70th anniversary of the beloved radio show, Ambridge at War takes readers back to before it all began . . . ‘Intriguing, comforting and endearingly familiar’ Katie Fforde It’s 1940 and war has broken out. It is midnight at the turn of the year, and Walter Gabriel speaks the same line that opened the very first radio episode – 'And a Happy New Year to you all!' For Ambridge, a village in the heart of the English countryside, this year will bring change in ways no one was expecting. From the Pargetters at Lower Loxley to the loving, hard-working Archer family at Brookfield Farm, the war will be hard for all of them. And the New Year brings the arrival of evacuees to Ambridge, shaking things up in the close-knit rural community. As the villagers embrace wartime spirit, the families that listeners have known and loved for generations face an uphill battle to keep their secrets hidden. Especially as someone is intent on revealing those secrets to the whole village . . .