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A review by saguaros
Anne of Ingleside by L.M. Montgomery
1.0
Zzzzzzzzz YAWN. A big giant yawn. Boring and empty and sometimes even mean spirited. It focuses mostly on Anne’s children and they’re all boring boring boring—too good, pious, innocent. They get into scrapes but mostly because every other children in this book are mean and manipulative and cruel and get the Blythe children into trouble because they’ve grown up so loved and never lied to that it doesn’t occur to them that others can be mean to them. We briefly see Green Gables at the beginning, and have a chapter between Anne and Diana which mostly revolves around Diana whining that she’s getting fat, and then the narration mocking her for her weight (155lbs!) and her inability to stop eating cake while she has tea with Anne (and Lucy Maud makes sure we all know how thin and delicate Anne still is even after 7 children!) In fact, many characters are said to be fat in the most disparaging way possible. I’ve always thought Montgomery has a weird obsession with beauty (especially her heroines beauty) and how it reflects on the person, but it’s cranked out to 11 in this one (the only one worse I think, was in Kilmeny of the Orchard).
I don’t know if Montgomery had a word quota to fill but we waste a whole long chapter reading about the quilting circle while the gossip without interruptions about character we’re never seen or heard of. And the last two or three chapters are about Anne fearing that Gilbert doesn’t love her anymore and getting jealous of another woman—cattily so (but it’s okay because that woman is not nice! And she has no children! Which we should all pity her for). In fact, Anne and other characters have always been a bit judgemental but this book takes the cake. It’s not just a character here or there, it’s very clearly the author as well. It’s judgy and unkind more often than not. And too religious. I think it’s one of the longest books in the series and perhaps among the ones I’ve listened to the quickest, but only because I wanted to get rid of it and move on to something else.
There’s almost no delight here.
I don’t know if Montgomery had a word quota to fill but we waste a whole long chapter reading about the quilting circle while the gossip without interruptions about character we’re never seen or heard of. And the last two or three chapters are about Anne fearing that Gilbert doesn’t love her anymore and getting jealous of another woman—cattily so (but it’s okay because that woman is not nice! And she has no children! Which we should all pity her for). In fact, Anne and other characters have always been a bit judgemental but this book takes the cake. It’s not just a character here or there, it’s very clearly the author as well. It’s judgy and unkind more often than not. And too religious. I think it’s one of the longest books in the series and perhaps among the ones I’ve listened to the quickest, but only because I wanted to get rid of it and move on to something else.
There’s almost no delight here.