Anne of Green Gables book review

Anne of Green Gables by L.M. Montgomery
Published by Signet Book on May 6, 2003
Pages: 320
Goodreads

As soon as Anne Shirley arrives at the snug white farmhouse called Green Gables, she is sure she wants to stay forever . . . but will the Cuthberts send her back to to the orphanage? Anne knows she's not what they expected—a skinny girl with fiery red hair and a temper to match. If only she can convince them to let her stay, she'll try very hard not to keep rushing headlong into scrapes and blurting out the first thing that comes to her mind. Anne is not like anyone else, the Cuthberts agree; she is special—a girl with an enormous imagination. This orphan girl dreams of the day when she can call herself Anne of Green Gables.

Anne of Green Gables has been on my list to read for a really long time and I never got around to reading it. But since I read Little Women I thought that now might be the right time to read more classic children’s stories and I was right. I loved this one, I loved the way that the characters interacted with one another and Anne’s imagination and way of looking at the world blew me away. This book went beyond the normal part of having a moral within a children’s book and added a whole host of them. Some of the mistakes that Anne made were hilarious and others offered a really unique lesson to be learnt. It was overall a really interesting read.

The characters in this book were a beautiful thing. I genuinely loved getting to know them and their family ways. I think my favourite character and relationship in Anne of Green Gables would definitely have to be Matthew and Anne’s. Their entire exchange made my heart swell and I loved reading and learning their world through their eyes and the way they interacted. This was also the most heartbreaking part of the book, and I sobbed once I realised what exactly had happened. I did think the other characters in the book, especially the other girls fell a little short but I had to remind myself that this was a book written when girls weren’t expected to be much of anything.

The best bit of Anne of Green Gables for me would be the way that Anne sees the world and then describes the world. I think there are some really great moments all the way through this book, both that make you laugh or cry. The best moments are definitely when Anne makes a mistake and she has to apologise for that. These were the moments that made me laugh out loud and they made me fall into the book all the more. There were also moments, realistically so where real life took over and there was a lot of drama and upset, it was really well done and something I really appreciated.

I think the worst bit of Anne of Green Gables has more to do with me than it does with the actual book. I wanted there to be a difference with the other characters. I felt like all the girls apart from the main three were all the same person and I think there could have been a little bit more personality in each of them. But it didn’t massively affect my reading of the story because the other characters more than made up for them.

I would definitely recommend Anne of Green Gables, I loved the story and I will definitely be reading it to my children, if and when I ever have some. There are some lovely morals within the plot and I might even pick up the next one in the series.

Have you read Anne of Green Gables? What did you think of the story was it one of your favourites? Let me know in the comments!