Audio: Marilla of Green Gables - Sarah McCoy

Audio CD, 9 h

Narrator: Cassandra Campbell

Published October 23rd 2018 by HarperAudio

Historical fiction

For review

My Thoughts:

In a way this one was kind of sad. There is a budding romance, but you know it will not have a happy ending and that she will have regrets.

It starts with Marilla at 13. She is mostly at home, she has no friends, but she is content. Life is busy on a farm. I liked young Marilla. She was kind and sweet. She does make a friend later on, a friend who will be her best friend for life.

I do get that her mother's death had a huge impact on her. She felt that she had to care for her father and brother. She had no time for herself, and that is so sad. I also felt sorry for Matthew, poor man, he wanted love too. See, this is a sad book, think how long they had to wait to find that sunshine in their lives!

There is a beau too, John Blythe, and how I wanted to smack her over the head! Yes yes, there can not be  happy ending, but but! There could have been. That is the sad part.

It is a book that deals with farmlife and the slow country life. How things shape us.

And then it jumps ahead and she is suddenly 36 or something. Life has gone on without her.

Ok since the blurb tells it all. There is also talk about what is happening in the world. And she feels she wants to help protect slaves that escape. She does not do much,, but even the small things can be a different if everyone made an effort.

This is not the Marilla that I remember from the movies, tv series (oh I have to watch that new one!!).  I also realised that Marilla is actually not that old, ok 50, but still. And she does say the windy island age you. It makes me understand her more, because the books do not give us a lot about her. The author of this book imagines that for us.

Conclusion:
And interesting what if. Still poor Matthew! You will see.

Narrator

She did well with the feel of the book. It is not a book that hurries toward something. It is life, the small things, the big questions. A slow sort of reflection that she handled well.

Blurb

Plucky and ambitious, Marilla Cuthbert is thirteen years old when her world is turned upside down. Her beloved mother dies in childbirth, and Marilla suddenly must bear the responsibilities of a farm wife: cooking, sewing, keeping house, and overseeing the day-to-day life of Green Gables with her brother, Matthew and father, Hugh.

In Avonlea-a small, tight-knit farming town on a remote island-life holds few options for farm girls. Her one connection to the wider world is Aunt Elizabeth Izzy Johnson, her mother's sister, who managed to escape from Avonlea to the bustling city of St. Catharines. An opinionated spinster, Aunt Izzy's talent as a seamstress has allowed her to build a thriving business and make her own way in the world.

Emboldened by her aunt, Marilla dares to venture beyond the safety of Green Gables and discovers new friends and new opportunities. Joining the Ladies Aid Society, she raises funds for an orphanage run by the Sisters of Charity in nearby Nova Scotia that secretly serves as a way station for runaway slaves from America. Her budding romance with John Blythe, the charming son of a neighbor, offers her a possibility of future happiness-Marilla is in no rush to trade one farm life for another. She soon finds herself caught up in the dangerous work of politics, and abolition-jeopardizing all she cherishes, including her bond with her dearest John Blythe. Now Marilla must face a reckoning between her dreams of making a difference in the wider world and the small-town reality of life at Green Gables.