A look at a more innocent time.

I discovered L.M. Montgomery when I was in college.  I realize most girls were reading about Anne Shirley and Emily of New Moon in the formative years between grade school and high school, but I seemed to skip over the Young Adult section of the library and headed directly towards teen and adult literature at that age.  When I was in college I discovered many of my contemporaries had a literary vocabulary I did not understand.  They would talk about the beauty and themes of literature I had never heard about.  I decided I needed to go back and read the books they were talking about. 

I started with the Anne of Green Gable series.  As I read about the sweet characters with their innocent souls and pure emotions I fell in love with them.  Montgomery made her characters so real and expressed emotions with such purity the reader has no choice but to fall in love.  I couldn't get enough of reading her works.

Although Montgomery's characters are sweet and innocent she still knows how to express pain, sorrow and loss.  I admire her strong, independent female heroines and want my characters to have the same sense of realism.