Anne of Green Gables by L. M. Montgomery

INFORMATION

Goodreads: Anne of Green Gables
Series: Anne #1
Source: Library
Published: 1908

SUMMARY

Matthew and Marilla Cuthbert plan to adopt an orphan boy to help on the farm, but a mistake sends them eleven-year-old Anne Shirley instead.  Anne has an imagination as big as her heart, but also a penchant for getting into scrapes.

Review

Reading a Montgomery book always feels like going home.  Montgomery’s vivid descriptions of landscapes, her dreamy-eyed heroines, and her knack for describing people and their small quirks and foibles all make her world come to life, until I feel as if I could step into the pages and walk down a forest path along with her characters.  Something about her stories just feel right, and make my own world seem a little brighter, too.

Anne of Green Gables is, of course, Montgomery’s most famous work, and it’s not difficult to guess why.  Anne is a girl full of imagination who longs for beauty and who also finds herself forever getting into scrapes.  She can take readers from a moonlit journey to distant shores back to the harsh reality of farm life, red hair, and broken slates in an instant.  Though she was introduced in 1908, touches of the sentimental lie lightly on the story, and Anne’s adventures and concerns feel as fresh and relevant as ever thanks to an emphasis on how she feels about events–perhaps Anne desires puffed sleeves more than anything else in the world, but readers today can just as easily imagine what fashions or items they need to feel they fit in and belong.

Anne of Green Gables is a special book, the kind that makes you feel you are spending time with old friends and that inspires you to look around with new eyes.  I never read Anne but I want to capture something of her spirit in my own life, whether that means letting my imagination soar without feeling awkward, or finding ways to be kind and cheerful.  And I always look at nature anew, appreciating the glories as I think Anne would.  This is the type of book you want to hold on to, and not forget.