mithen

Alternate title: "The author has a lot of feelings about WW1, Part One". This is the more subtle of the two, and mostly takes the form of ominous foreshadowing.

I liked this book more than I expected, but then my expectations were low. It's better than Anne of Ingleside in the sense that it has an overarching plot amidst the episodes. However, it's not really about Anne's kids, but the 4 Meredith children who move into the manse when their widowed father takes a job as the Presbyterian minister. Overall, there is less focus on the natural world - though the passages that do are the best, as usual - and the imagination and more on what it's like to live in a small town and have your life depend on public opinion.

The overarching theme of this book - though I'm not sure how much of this is intentional - is "what does it mean for children to be good?" with the corollary "what constitutes appropriate punishment for misdeeds?"

We learn at the beginning that the Blythe's housekeeper Susan spanks all of the Blythe children when they misbehave, except for Shirley and she's pissed when Gilbert spanks him. She's also upset when she learns that Mary Vance, an orphan adopted to be a servant by another, is repeatedly whipped by her master. From my modern perspective, hitting children for disciplinary reasons is abuse no matter what the motivations/relationship, but the fact that Susan takes Mary's side is meant to show how extreme it is. (Not sure where Montgomery herself falls, but I suspect that she aligns with Gilbert and Susan on this front.)

Meanwhile, you have the undisciplined Meredith children attempting to discipline themselves via a "Good Conduct Club" and coming up with punishments that either make the existing situation worse or cause new problems. Mr. Meredith attempts to punish one of his children for misbehavior, but can't bring himself to do it (correctly, in my opinion) and it's chalked up to his sensitive soul.

Another theme that continues from previous books is "doing the right thing, even when it's painful or inconvenient, will ultimately be rewarded"; a good chunk of the plot hinges on a string of dominoes from various incidents that lead to the happy ending. So Faith yelling at Norman Douglas leads to him going to church which leads him to reunite with Ellen which leads to Rosemary being able to marry John Meredith and become a mother figure to the Meredith children, thus resolving the discipline problem (since a huge chunk of it is due to neglect - John Meredith, despite his good points, is neither equipped to do take care of his children, nor will he allow others to do so!).

Given what I have learned of Montgomery's personal life, I suspect a lot of John Meredith's character is based on her minister husband and his own breakdown, which caused him to disassociate from the world, except here, it is... if not treatable, than at least somewhat more benign than what she herself experienced. Again, we have writing as therapy and wish fulfillment, as Montgomery simultaneously wrestles with her own issues while giving her characters what she cannot have. She's trying to recapture more innocent, upbeat vibes of the earlier books but can't quite get there after everything she's experienced.

As always, marriage is the most important decision in every adult character's life and their choice in spouse determines their happiness going forward. The good news is that second chances are possible, and as long as there's life, there's hope.

This book is a well-constructed character study of village life and childhood hijinks, but I'm not sure I would want to read it again. It feels like Montgomery is kind of coasting on the success of the earlier Anne books by having her appear briefly here and there so as to draw in readers before pivoting to a completely different story and completely different characters who just happen to share the same space. (This technique was also used in the short story collections Chronicles of Avonlea and Further Chronicles of Avonlea.) I can't really blame her for that, but there are times where it definitely feels like a bait and switch. And the obsession with war, years before the war even begins, is quite draining at times, and makes it harder to enjoy the antics when we already know bad things are coming.