“Anne of Green Gables” is a 1908 novel by Canadian author L.M. Montgomery and is widely considered a children’s novel even though it is written for all ages. It is the author’s most popular work but she also wrote short stories, poems and essays. After the success of the first book, she wrote a series of sequels with Anne as the main character. They center around the adventures of Anne Shirley, an 11-year-old orphan girl who is mistakenly sent to live with Matthew and Marilla Cuthbert. The original novel has sold more than 50 million copies, has been translated into twenty languages and is taught to students around the world. There have been many film and television adaptations in the past and the most recent one aired on CBC in Canada and will be available to stream on Netflix on Friday May 12, 2017. It stars Amybeth McNulty as Anne Shirley, Geraldine James as Marilla Cuthbert and R.H. Thomson as Matthew Cuthbert.

According to Amazon, “Anne of Green Gables” tells the story of a young orphan named Anne from a fictional community in Nova Scotia who is sent to live with a middle-aged brother and sister.  They initially wanted a boy to help around the farm in the fictional town of Avonlea on Prince Edward Island. Anne is highly imaginative, eager to please and has a flair for the dramatic. She is also very vain and hates her red hair and thin frame and at first Marilla wants to send her back but ends up changing her mind when Matthew intervenes. Eventually she adapts to her new life in the close-knit farming village and the country school where she makes new friends while excelling in her studies.