Anne’s House of Dreams

Anne’s House of Dreams came out in 1917 and marks a real shift in the series. Anne and Gilbert get married in the opening chapters and move to Four Winds Harbour on the north shore of Prince Edward Island, where Gilbert sets up a country medical practice. The little white house by the sea, the house of dreams of the title, is one of Montgomery’s most evocative settings. The book covers their first few years there.

The new neighbours are vivid. Captain Jim, the old lighthouse keeper, is one of the warmest characters Montgomery ever wrote. Miss Cornelia Bryant, who hates men on general principle and gets all the best lines. Leslie Moore, a beautiful young woman trapped in a marriage to a husband who has lost his memory after an accident. The book deals with loss in ways the earlier novels mostly avoided. Anne and Gilbert lose their first child. Captain Jim’s death at the end is one of the most quietly devastating scenes Montgomery wrote. Underneath the gentle surface, this is a book about adult life beginning in earnest. A turning point in the series.