I didn't like this one as much as the first book (there's just not enough Gilbert, am I right?) but I definitely enjoyed continuing this adventure with Anne. There are so many new characters in this one but, unfortunately, I didn't seem to love all of them. The writing stays just as beautiful as it was in the first book. Also, that last paragraph. Be still my beating heart.



Can't wait to start Anne of the Island!

The second in the Anne series, this was written in a hurry because the publishers were clamouring for a sequel to the immensely successful 'Anne of Green Gables.' As a result, LM Montgomery used material she had already written into various short stories and the first chapter opens with such a tale. It is all very charming, if not quite as compelling as the first novel. In the sequel, the Anne is now16 and becomes the teacher at Avonlea school. Many beloved characters from 'Anne of Green Gables' appear again, as well as new ones. Mr. Harrison takes the farm next to Green Gables and his eccentric behaviour enlivens Anne's life. She meets (and loves) middle-aged Miss Lavendar Lewis and becomes deeply interested in her eventual destiny.Paul Irving is her most promising pupil and kindred spirit and twins Dora and Davy enter her life with humorous and heartwarming results. Anne is maturing but still has her great ideals and her innocent appreciation of the simple values of life, of nature and of the power of imagination. She is becoming a beautiful woman, as well as a clever one. During the two years covered by this book, she learns many life lessons, grows wiser and learns how to influence the lives of her pupils for good. Yet she resists full womanhood, preferring to cling to her childhood joys and values. Nevertheless, she is beginning to take her place in the adult world, as village teacher and founding member of the Avonlea Village Improvement Society, which works to improve the way that Avonlea is kept by it occupants, with many setbacks.
There is a delicious, homespun quality to these books. Montgomery writes about her characters with great affection, so that we are inclined to love them too. She herself grew up on Prince Edward island in Canada, in somewhat difficult and emotionally repressive circumstances, and she draws on her experiences in this series. It would be amazing if a child who has been as deprived as Anne in her early years were not emotionally damaged by it. Yet she is as much a lady as if she were brought up in a privileged household. It is all a bit hard to swallow, but if one suspends disbelief on this point, the stories are delightful and unforgettable. They were written in an age when people still believed in moral self-improvement and the moral vision expressed in them is both moving and inspiring. Loved it.

Anne of Avonlea by LM Montgomery i started off enjoying the 2nd in the series of Anne books. I expected to finish it today. I love the wholesomeness. The quirky Anne. Then tragedy struck in my life. My beloved companion (shown in my pic) tragically died. I can’t finish the book right now. I only had 20% to go. But I enjoyed the calm, peace and serenity this book brought. I will pick it up again. The library will take it back anyday. One day I will pick up where I left off. Never take anything for granted. A single bra strap can ruin a day and a person’s life aka a dog.

تصمیم ندارم که جلدهای بعدی رو بخونم. خداحافظ اَن که احتمالا به دانشگاه میری و در آستانه‌ی تجربه‌ی عشقی، خداحافظ دایانا که در مسیر ازدواجی و خداحافظ خانم لوندر دل‌نشین دل‌شکسته که از قلعه‌ی طلسم‌شده خارج شدی.
شیرین بود. گرچه به اندازه‌ی جلد اول خیال‌پردازانه نبود و کوچیک‌تر دوسش داشتم، اما تجلی بلوغ که بود، الهام‌بخش که بود.

+شاید بقیه‌ش رو هم خوندم. بستگی به الهامات حضرت کتابیل داره.

Przemiła lektura, ale nie miała tego posmaku, co tom pierwszy - zabieram się za kolejne tomy.

Ania i Gilbert <3

OCENA: 4,5 ⭐️

Mel

„Ania z Avonlea” napełniła mnie szczerym, autentycznym pięknem z poetycką mgiełką. Podrasowała także umiejętność wiecznego romantyzowania rzeczywistości (nie żebym nie korzystała z niej wcześniej).

pierwsze czytanie: 5☆
drugie czytanie: 5☆

Why did Anne have to grow up so fast?

The first book was fabulous! Lots of fun mischief but the second has her at 16 already! Where did those four years go? n  Laura Ingalls Wilder didn't skimp out on the childhood.n

I enjoyed this book - seeing Anne blossom into a young school teacher (aside: Totally not fair that everyone get such great jobs out of high school?? Same with Laura Ingalls Wilder. They just handed out jobs to anyone who would take them!)

A pet peeve of mine was really played upon. All kids are precocious angels. Yes, Anne has some struggles but you know from the start that she's going to overcome them magnificently.

It's a little too predictable. And the precocious moments were bordering annoying.

Also, did anyone else feel for poor Dora? Her twin brother, Davy, is a complete bullying snot yet Anne and Marilla just adore him (they even admit that the care more for that little snit)?!

Sure Dora is quiet, but she is dutiful and obedient and deserves twice as much attention as they are lavishing on that horrible Davy.

Still loved this book though!!

Audiobook Comments
Read by Barbara Caruso and she really let this audio shine.

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n  n   

“I’d like to add some beauty to life,” said Anne dreamily. “I don’t exactly want to make people know more…though I know that is the noblest ambition…but I’d love to make them have a pleasanter time because of me…to have some little joy or happy thought that would never have existed if I hadn’t been born.”

n  n

It's an ultimate joy when the second book in the series is even better than the first - and if the first was perfect then the second is square of perfection? Perfection × Perfection. Math was never my strong point

In this book, Anne is 16 going on 17, back at Avonlea and Green Gables taking care of dear Marilla and the little twins, walking across the paths and valleys with their magical names, going on perfect picnics with her friends, meeting new kindred spirits, forming a society for The Improvement of Avonlea and starting her new job as a teacher.
Of course, she gets into a lot of adventures, she learns a lot of new things and she always believes in her ideals.
At the end of the day, the reader loves Anne for precisely that; her ability to dream with her eyes open, her endless faith in the good, her wish for Improvement and knowledge and enjoyment of the worldly things like finding a flower in the garden or making friends aka kindred spirits, baking a cake, and helping people be themselves.

n  “After all ,” Anne had said to Marilla once, “I believe the nicest and sweetest days are not those on which anything very splendid or wonderful or exciting happens but just those that bring simple little pleasures, following one another softly, like pearls slipping off a string.”n

L. M. Montgomery let her views on many topics be present in the work, each chapter an episode for itself; just like book one, this one is following the episodic structure.

n  "I’m really a very happy, contented little person in spite of my broken heart. My heart did break, if ever a heart did, when I realized that Stephen Irving was not coming back. But, Anne, a broken heart in real life isn’t half as dreadful as it is in books. It’s a good deal like a bad tooth…though you won’t think that a very romantic simile. It takes spells of aching and gives you a sleepless night now and then, but between times it lets you enjoy life and dreams and echoes and peanut candy as if there were nothing the matter with it. And now you’re looking disappointed. You don’t think I’m half as interesting a person as you did five minutes ago when you believed I was always the prey of a tragic memory bravely hidden beneath external smiles. That’s the worst…or the best…of real life, Anne. It won’t let you be miserable. It keeps on trying to make you comfortable…and succeeding…even when you’re determined to be unhappy and romantic."n

n  Final thoughtsn: I completely agree with Mark Twain, this is the sweetest story about childhood and growing up ever written.next to Little women

n  

“I suppose that’s how it looks in prose. But it’s very different if you look at it through poetry…and I think it’s nicer…” Anne recovered herself and her eyes shone and her cheeks flushed…“to look at it through poetry.”
Marilla glanced at the radiant young face and refrained from further sarcastic comments. Perhaps some realization came to her that after all, it was better to have, like Anne, “the vision and the faculty divine”…that gift which the world cannot bestow or take away, of looking at life through some transfiguring…or revealing?…medium, whereby everything seemed apparelled in celestial light, wearing a glory and a freshness not visible to those who, like herself and Charlotta the Fourth, looked at things only through prose."

n
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I never thought that there will ever be a book that I will love just as much as n  Little Womenn but here it is. Review to come.

Second Read:

I’m really enjoying rereading these books. I hope to finish the series this year for the first time, as last time I only got three books in. Anne is someone you wish you knew in real life and I like the older adult characters around her too.

First Read:

I love this series. Anne can make you see the good in everything. A simple, gentle read. Like watching a black-and-white movie from a simpler time.