"Anne of Windy Poplars," by Lucy Maud Montgomery

The Protagonist: Anne Shirley. While Gilbert's away at medical school, she'll be starting as Summerside's newest school principal.
The Rub: Summerside's got some nice folks, but also a nasty "royal" family and a horde of Evil Old People to contend with.

The Secondary Characters:

Aunt Kate and Aunt Chatty: Two sweet but diametrically opposed elderly spinsters with whom Anne boards.

Rebecca Dew: Kate and Chatty's cantankerous servant.

Elizabeth: An emotionally-starved orphan raised by two unloving crones, whom Anne befriends.

Angst Checklist:

• Old Ladies Be Trippin'
• Rampant Emotional Abuse
• Family politics
• Being unmarried at 28 is worse than death, for reals
• Crazy couples who really shouldn't get married
• Cats You Love to Hate
• Houses Full of Dead People

Anne of Green Gables is a beloved classic - it's certainly one of my favourite books - but not as many people read the later books in the series (such as Anne of Avonlea and Anne of the Island). It's easy to see why. Anne has far fewer flaws (most of her "scrapes" in this book are by accident), the drama is far milder, the storytelling rambling and unfocused.

For me, though, the Anne books remain my jam - the ultimate comfort read. With church socials and sponge cakes, saucy gossip, and lovingly-described scenery, it's a lilac-scented meandering walk down a summer lane with the occasional incisive scrap of social commentary.

Windy Poplars is mostly comprised of Anne's letters to her fiancé Gilbert during the three years they are separated (Anne to teach in Summerside as a school principal, Gilbert to finish medical school).

Anne has a tough go of it at first. Summerside's prolific and close-knit ruling family, the Pringles, had their own candidate for principal, and they are determined to topple Anne from her perch by any polite means necessary.

On top of that, Summerside has a surfeit of Emotionally Abusive Old People. Anne spends a chunk of the book rescuing girls and young women from their manipulative, grasping crone relatives who are determined to suck all the happiness out of them like Bette Midler in Hocus Pocus. It happens so often I wondered if all these old biddies and coots had some sort of club to Ruin Young People's Lives.

Anne also saves a couple of Bitter Spinsters (both unhappily unmarried by 28! Gasp!) from future crone-hood.

Through it all, Anne maintains her sunny optimism - life is happier when one turns the other cheek, to admire the flowers or the sea or some other deliciously-described aspect of Prince Edward Island scenery. While she's much tamer than she was in her slate-bashing days, Anne has her spirited moments (in one chapter, she harbours delightfully violent fantasies against one of the worst Summerside crones).

And yes, as mentioned before, the drama is milder, but if there is any theme in Windy Poplars it is that people are often their own worst enemy. Yes, the Crones and the Pringles are nasty, but a lot of the characters Anne encounters perpetuate their own unhappiness - either through inaction or indecision, or because they've entrenched themselves in their own bitter outlook on life and need an outsider's perspective to adjust their attitude.

While I have yet to visit Prince Edward Island myself, I so love visiting the P.E.I. of Montgomery's novels.

A very sentimental, rose-coloured A+