The Story...Anne's own true love, Gilbert Blythe, is finally a doctor, and in the sunshine of the old orchard, among their dearest friends, they are about to speak their vows. Soon the happy couple will be bound for a new life together and their own dream house, on the misty purple shores of Four Winds Harbor.
A new life means fresh problems to solve, fresh surprises. Anne and Gilbert will make new friends and meet their neighbors: Captain Jim, the lighthouse attendant, , with his sad stories of the sea; Miss Cornelia Bryant, the lady who speaks from the heart - and speaks her mind; and the tragically beautiful Leslie Moore, into whose dark life Anne shines a brilliant light.
A Reader's Experience...
Once again, I find it exhilerating and inspiring as a reader to be transported through new key stages of Anne's life, as if I were living them right along side of her. This time, she has gone from childhood to college, from working girl to wife and mother. As a result, this book now carries with it an entirely new tone and significance. There is an added moral and spiritual depth, profoundly shocking revelations, and life altering changes.
On a moral level, readers grapple with the history and dilemmas of Leslie Moore. Ultimately, Anne follows her own conscience in befriending her, despite her harsh past and cold resistence, and untimately, Leslie goes through with a decision that, while controversial among the inhabitants of Four Winds, was very much hers to make. I wonder if I would have been brave or bold enough to do the same thing, and am reminded that we need to learn to trust our own judgement and accept the (most often unpredictable) results of such decisions as they unfold.
Although I like to read a story that realistically flows forward, I also love an element of unanticpated shock as a reader. In this story, Dick Moore isn't really Dick Moore - and I honestly didn't see it coming. Then follows the delicious moment when most everything becomes clearer, and a character like Leslie has a clean slate with which to re-think her past and future course. Cornelia's engagement is yet another instance where we are surprised by what is revealed about a character and must re-think our assumptions as readers, and we can vividly appreciate and picture Anne and Gilbert's "kerflummexed" reaction - priceless.
Most parents will say (although I can't personally speak to the matter) that becoming a parent changes everything, and for Anne this would be no exception. The pure, raw emotion and tender, loving instincts which she feels towards her first two children are touching and natural, and I believe that Anne's entire world view is shifted. Nothing is more real or important to her as the child she lost after a short time and the child she was raising. It seems that Anne will only now understand the past experience of Diana and other friends who became mothers before her. Just as Leslie Moore is able to start life over again with Owen, so do Cornelia and Marshall, as well as Anne and Gilbert as they upgrade to a brand new home. Such new changes are all about real adult freedoms and responsabilities, and I can truly feel the rewards and fulfillment of starting over and moving on.
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