Buried In Print

For sheer Anne-ish-ness, however, it would be hard to beat Sharon Jennings’ Home Free.

Lee (Leanna) Mets is excited to learn that an orphan will be moving in with the couple who lives next door to their family and she hopes that Cassandra Jovanovich will be like Anne. She’s not. At least not as Lee had hoped.

“Cassandra didn’t know anything about Anne Shirley, but I was pretty sure she knew all about Anne’s depths of despair.”

But many aspects of Lee’s life seem to have slipped directly from L.M. Montgomery’s stories. Miss Gowdy is like Miss Stacy. Kathy is like Josie Pye. Mrs. McMillan, the Sunday School teacher, is like Mrs. Allan. And Lee’s heart beats just like Anne’s (when she sees Gilbert when she’s half-drowned) when she sees David (who shares his copy of Cue for Treason with Lee).

Not all of these comparisons are drawn outright. But some are. Like this:

“I wanted to take my slate — of course, these are the Sixties and we don’t use slates these days — and break it over someone’s head, just like Anne Shirley did to Gilbert Blythe.”

It’s impossible to avoid the Anne-ish-ness of this sweet, bookish tale.

More, here, if you're curious!