Early Autumn is a 1926 novel that won the Pulitzer Prize for the Novel in 1927.
The novel is set in the fictional Massachusetts town of Durham shortly after World War I. The Pentland family is rich and part of the upper class, but their world is rapidly changing. The old Congregational church the Pentlands long favored has disbanded as more have left Durham, replaced by immigrant Roman Catholics with very different religious customs. The Pentlands once ruled upper-class society in Durham, and still do. But even upper-class society is changing: Many of the "old line" families have either died off or moved away, while many of new money wealthy have moved into the area who do not share the same old-fashioned values and observe the same old-fashioned norms of behavior that the Pentlands do.