Written in 1926 by the author of the beloved Anne of Green Gables series, this is the story of Valancy, a 29 year old timid mouse of a person, considered an old maid by her family and the town generally. One fan has made a delightful book trailer for her favourite novel – The Blue Castle.If you think your relatives argue too much over Sunday dinner or are just impossible to live with I think every reader dreams of going there. The Blue Castle ticks so many boxes for me and I especially love the scenes on Mistawis – the island where Valancy eventually finds herself. As always in a Montgomery novel their are glorious descriptions of the natural world – the Canadian landscape with which she was so familiar. Montgomery is brilliant at drawing characters and she pulls no punches in depicting Valancy’s ghastly extended family. I love this book for its humanity and for its wonderful twists and turns. The novel has a cast of intriguing characters including the mysterious and disreputable Barney Snaith and the drunken reprobate, Abel Gay, whose tragic daughter, Cissy, Valancy befriends.

One day, an unexpected medical diagnosis changes everything for Valancy and, for the first time in her dull grey life, she rebels. You can’t help liking her and, personally, I wanted to kick most of her relatives for their moronic treatment of her. But Valancy has something – she’s one of those characters who draw you in. She’s in her late twenties, downtrodden and neglected by her snobbish family and destined to be an old maid. The main character is Valancy Stirling ‘of the Deerwood Stirlings’. And not just because it’s considered to be one of her few ‘adult’ books (it can be easily read by teens). Montgomery wrote the book in 1926 and it took me completely by surprise. I’ve read and re-read them, revelling in Anne’s adventures and her feisty, optimistic character but it was several years before I discovered The Blue Castle. I love Lucy Maud Montgomery’s books and especially her Anne of Green Gables series. For me, The Blue Castle is one of those novels. It’s funny how some books stay with you for years and years after first reading them.

The blue castle montgomery