Emily of New Moon (by Lucy Maud Montgomery)

(Amazon UK link)

The Canadian author LM Montgomery is, of course, best known for her classic book 'Anne of Green Gables' and its many sequels. But I've read that some people consider her lesser-known 'Emily' series to be better in some ways, so when I learned that it had been republished fairly recently (and inexpensively) I decided to get hold of the first book and see what it was like.

Emily, aged eleven, lives with her adored father and a rather bad-tempered housekeeper called Ellen. She has two beloved cats and is a highly imaginative child. As the book opens, Emily's father is dying of consumption and she has no idea what will happen to her. This book is set in Canada around a hundred years ago before consumption (TB) became curable with antibiotics, and also before children were expected to have much of a voice.

After he dies, several aunts and uncles from her mother's side of the family arrive, and discuss in rather impolite tones what they will do with Emily. They feel a definite responsibility towards her, although they cast her mother off when she married her father, but none of them find her particularly attractive. Poor Emily is not the kind of child they expect. She speaks her mind, she expects to be treated with respect and honesty, and she wants more than anything to be loved.

I did like Emily herself as a character. She is different from Anne in that she has had a happy early childhood rather than being in a series of orphanages. Emily's relatives are quite well-off, too, and can easily afford to keep her even though they don't particularly want her. Her imagination is more fanciful than Anne's, too. There's no need for her to long for a more interesting name, or for a family. Instead she imagines anthropomorphisms: the 'Wind Woman' who whistles and sighs around the house, for instance.

The overall plot of the book is similar to that of 'Anne of Green Gables'. Emily must adjust to her new relatives, and they must adjust to her. There are misunderstandings, clashes and confusion; there is also homesickness, badly hurt feelings and eventually a dawning of love and acceptance. But the undercurrents and subplots are quite different. Emily's first great friend of her own age is not a 'kindred spirit'; this is immediately clear to the reader, but not to poor Emily.

Moreover rather than two elderly guardians, she has three: strict Aunt Elizabeth, who never shows her feelings and expects instant obedience; loving Aunt Laura who sometimes compromises Emily's integrity by suggesting she do things behind Aunt Elizabeth's back; and poetic Cousin Jimmy who had an accident as a child and has never fully grown up in his mind.

Emily goes to school for the first time, makes various friends, gets to know neighbours, and - almost in passing - teaches her adult companions a great deal about honesty and respect. She has a strong moral code but is no goody-goody. She feels anger and bitterness, and often exaggerates her feelings which she takes out in writing letters to her dead father.

I didn't find the book flowed as well as 'Anne of Green Gables', partly due to the letters. Quite a few of them are given in full, complete with childish spelling mistakes in the earlier ones. This certainly means that Emily's personal perspective is made clear, but I felt it slightly jarred in places. However I've never really been keen on books with a large number of letters interspersed, and I don't find it easy reading misspelled words! So all credit to Lucy Maud Montgomery that I kept reading.

Overall I thought it was an enjoyable book with some moving sections and even a little suspense in places. It's intended for children of around age ten and upwards. While the main appeal is probably to girls, it's not exclusively so. My fifteen-year-old son who loves the 'Anne' series read this and very much liked it. It would make a good read-aloud, too, for children of almost any age. The language is a little old-fashioned, but no more so than most classic children's books of this era.

So while I don't think I'd rank it higher than 'Anne of Green Gables' in my affections, it's a close rival. Once I'd read this I was eager to get hold of the sequels, and will definitely be reading them again some time. Try it if you like children's books of this era, avoid it if you don't!