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Before Green Gables: The Prequel to Anne of Green Gables | 
 enlarge | Author: Budge Wilson
Creator: Renee Raudman
Publisher: Tantor Media
Category: Book
List Price: $24.99
Buy New: $14.57
You Save: $10.42 (42%)
New (17) from $14.57
Avg. Customer Rating:  26 reviews
Sales Rank: 1730059
Format: Audiobook, Cd
Media: Audio CD
Edition: MP3 Una
Number Of Items: 2
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.3
Dimensions (in): 7.5 x 5.3 x 0.6
ISBN: 1400156270
Dewey Decimal Number: 813.54
EAN: 9781400156276
ASIN: 1400156270
Publication Date: February 14, 2008
Shipping: Eligible for Super Saver Shipping
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
Shipping: International shipping available
Condition: Brand New, Perfect Condition, Please allow 4-14 business days for delivery. 100% Money Back Guarantee, Over 1,000,000 customers served.
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Product Description
A must-read for generations of book lovers, this remarkable prequel to the classic Anne of Green Gables is the story of Anne Shirley's life before her arrival at Green Gables---a heartwarming tale of a precocious child whose lively imagination and relentless spirit help her to overcome difficult circumstances and of a young girl's ability to love, learn, and above all, dream.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 21 more reviews...
Celebrate 100 years July 22, 2008
I must confess, I could never quite manage the series of the Anne books when I was a child. I would skip over the long passages where Anne would ramble on so. It shocked me that there was a character in literary history that could talk more than me. So I would skip to where there was action, and pictures. The copy that I had when I was 10(and still have) had color plates that helped move the story along. But when one entire page was one long monologue of Anne's dramatic speech about something describing the Haunted Wood, or the Lake of Shining Waters, I tended to skip it.
But that isn't to say that I didn't get the main point of the story, and that I didn't have a genuine love for the characters, because I did. So when PBS released the Kevin Sullivan production with Meagan Follows as Anne Shirley, I was in love with the books all over again, even though I knew the movie mixed them up, and cut them back drastically (Davie and Dora, where are you??). I even convinced my mom to take a family summer trip to P.E.I with her and my older brother (what a sport!) so I could see the Anne house, the red clay beaches, and all that my imagination had created while speed-reading the books and watching the movies. My trip did not disappoint. I loved it. And I hope future generations of Anne readers will get a chance to take this trip as well.
So now it is the 100 year anniversary and a writer has taken it upon herself to create Anne's world before Montgomery imagined it, using hints mentioned in the previous novels. This is no small feat, and Wilson has done a marvelous job. She has to please Anne fans and critics alike.
Remember, Anne's life before the Cuthbert's was not a happy one, she's an orphan, and Wilson does not shy away from the grim reality of being parentless during this time period. Despite baby Anne's horrid homelife, her exuberance shines through. She has an imagination that allows her to rise above the servitude she is forced to live and she survives within her own world. Wilson writes this without being too heavy handed, you cheer for Anne all the way through because you know how it is going to end.
Anne's journey to Green Gables is a wonderful read, not as amusing as the other books in the series because her transfers from horrible home to horrible home are so sad, but she meets many wonderful characters, mirroring the character journey in the other books. And these characters become her friends, and you know she has become important to them. This book is about her journey, her resilient spirit, and her search for a loving home.
Now if only it had color plates...
 Not great.. July 8, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
Many readers are familiar with the life Anne Shirley leads once she arrives at Matthew and Marilla Cuthbert's home but have been left to imagine what life was like for her before she stepped off the train at Bright River Station. Author Budge Wilson takes us into the first eleven years of Anne's world.
In Before Green Gables, we are introduced to Anne's seemingly perfect parents before they die from "the fever." She only gets three months with them before she is sent off to the Thomas household where she will never be loved the same way; in fact, that family will come to see her as an "ugly orphan" who is "just another mouth to feed." The only bright spot in her life is attending school--when she's old enough. When the Thomas family falls apart, she is immediately sent to work for the Hammond family, who have six children under the age of two (three sets of twins), and Anne is expected to take care of them. She remains in this home until it, too, falls apart, and her worst fear comes true--she will be sent to an orphanage. It is every bit as bad as she imagined it would be, and our sweet Anne Shirley hardens her heart to everyone and everything, focusing only on her tragic life and all that she has lost. She throws herself into schoolwork and chores until everything changes the day a lady arrives to select a "girl, about eleven-years-old, who can do hard work" as a favor for some people back home. When the head of the orphanage selects Anne as the girl to fill this request, Anne's life is forever changed.
Readers will appreciate Wilson's attempt to recreate the world L.M.Montgomery conceived for Anne, but they are sure to question some of the choices she made. Was Anne really the Pollyanna-esque character we see here? Was she really so self-possessed at such a young age? However, despite these questions, Wilson provides us with a good story about the red-headed girl we've loved for so many years.
Better Left Alone July 7, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
Before Green Gables by Budge Wilson
I have to admit, this is a book I secretly half-longed for and publicly dreaded (in book club, that is). Let's face it, L.M. Montgomery and Anne Shirley are icons. As much as I wanted to know what happened to Anne before she showed up at the Bright River station, if Montgomery couldn't do it, I was content just to let my imagination do the work. Unfortunately, not everyone felt that way, hence the new book, a prequel to Anne of Green Gables. Don't get me wrong, the book's not all bad, but to accurately assess it, we'll have to take it in two parts.
First of all, the story itself. We first meet Walter and Bertha Shirley, newly weds- poor but happy. They ooze contentment. Soon Anne arrives and the contentment deepens. Her mother adores and pets her, but never regains her strength from the birth. Fever sweeps through the village and it isn't long before Anne is an orphan. She moves to the Thomas household where we hope she'll at least feel some love for the sake of her dead mother, whom Mrs. Thomas worked for and adored. We soon learn that this is too much to hope for and before her fifth birthday, Anne is pressed into service. This is the single longest sojourn of Anne's life and it quickly becomes tedious. There are those who provide Anne with little rays of sunshine, but for the most part, her life is one of drudgery and exhaustion. And it goes on for 200 pages.
After Mr. Thomas' untimely demise, Anne is sent to live with the Hammond family. Anne's hopes are again dashed when she learns that she is not to be anything more than a hired hand. We also see Mrs. Hammond's postnatal depression and how her whole family is sucked into it. Again, there are those who provide Anne with some solace, but the drudgery and misery seem to be black holes that absorb it all.
At Mr. Hammond's death, Anne's greatest fears come true and she arrives at the Hopetown Orphanage. This is the most miserable of all her 'homes' and Anne is stripped several of her pitifully few possessions. Think shades of A Series of Unfortunate Events. Hope glimmers when Anne is chosen to go to Prince Edward Island and live with the Cuthberts and we leave her on the station platform waiting for the future.
In and of itself, the story is mostly consistent with what we know about Anne from Montgomery's telling. However, the story falls flat from Montgomery's hints of a neglected childhood. Certainly Anne is neglected, but it is not the total abandon that Montgomery hints is her background. Anne tells Marilla that no one ever did want her, but Wilson tells us that she was wanted- a few times. There are also inconsistencies in Anne's character and Wilson expects us to believe that Anne was using words like "exquisite" at the age of six. While I know Anne was an extraordinary child, even I cannot stretch my imagination that far.
Second, there is the writing style. Wilson's writing style is to the point. It falls far short from Montgomery's lilting style and the poetry of Anne is totally lost in Wilson's bluntness. There are also topics discussed that Montgomery wouldn't have touched with a ten foot pole. Anne doesn't sound like Anne and the descriptions fall so far short of Montgomery's that it's almost laughable.
Of course, Wilson is not a Montgomery scholar. That much is apparent in her acknowledgments when she thanks a scholar for providing her with references for Montgomery's hints of Anne's history. So she should not be blamed for not knowing Montgomery's style. But if Anne's history required a prequel, would it not have been better to choose a scholar who could put this together for us? Someone who could adopt Montgomery's style or at least some semblance of it?
While the story is a good story and would have been brilliant if it were written for another character, as Anne's story, it doesn't fit. It truly is unfortunate for those of us who love Anne and Montgomery.
 Wonderful read! June 14, 2008
Not really a kid's book, but truly Anne of Green Gables! A tear-jerker in places, but with spots that show you that even the most hopeless places there is light and the right heroine can find happiness and love even in the grim-ist homes. I picked it up and read it in one day, I just couldn't put it down!
My sister enjoyed it. June 2, 2008
0 out of 1 found this review helpful
I purchased this book for my sister. She has every book written by L. M. Montgomery and loved the "Anne" series. While I personally have not read this book, my sister loved it and said the author did a fantastic job capturing the essence of Anne Shirley.
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