Rainbow Valley
'Rainbow Valley' Summary
Anne Shirley has now been married to Gilbert Blythe for 15 years, and the couple have six children: Jem, Walter, Nan, Di, Shirley, and Rilla.
After a trip to London, Anne returns to the news that a new minister has arrived in Glen St. Mary. John Meredith is a widower with four young children: Gerald (Jerry), Faith, Una, and Thomas Carlyle (Carl). The children have not been properly brought up since the death of their mother, with only their father (who is easily absorbed by matters of theology) to parent them. The children are considered wild and mischievous by many of the families in the village (who tend only to hear about the Meredith children when they have got into some kind of scrape), causing them to question Mr. Meredith's parenting skills and his suitability as a minister.
For most of the book, only the Blythes know of the Meredith children's loyalty and kindness. They rescue an orphaned girl, Mary Vance, from starvation, and Una finds a home for her with Mrs. Marshall Elliott. When the children get into trouble, Faith sometimes tries to explain their behaviour to the townsfolk, which generally causes an even bigger scandal.
The Merediths, Blythes, and Mary Vance often play in a hollow called Rainbow Valley, which becomes a gathering place for the children in the book. Jem Blythe tries to help the Merediths behave better by forming the "Good-Conduct Club," in which the Merediths punish themselves for misdeeds. Their self-imposed punishments lead to Carl becoming very ill with pneumonia after spending hours in a graveyard on a wet night, and to Una fainting in church after fasting all day. When this happens, John Meredith is wracked with guilt over his failings as a father.
Mr. Meredith realizes that he should marry again and give the children a mother, though he has always thought he will never love anyone again as he did his late wife. He is surprised to find that he has fallen in love with Rosemary West, a woman in her late thirties who lives with her sister Ellen, who is ten years older. John proposes marriage to Rosemary, but Ellen forbids Rosemary from accepting, as years earlier they had promised each other never to leave the other following the deaths of their parents. However, Ellen eventually reunites with her childhood beau, Norman Douglas, who asks Rosemary to release Ellen from her promise so she can marry Norman. Rosemary agrees, but now thinks that John Meredith hates her.
Una overhears her father expressing feelings for Rosemary and goes to ask Rosemary to marry her father despite her misgivings about stepmothers, who Mary Vance has told her are always mean. Rosemary sets her mind at ease and agrees to speak to John Meredith again. They become engaged, and Rosemary and Ellen plan a double wedding in the Autumn.
Book Details
Language
EnglishOriginal Language
EnglishPublished In
1919Author
Lucy Maud Montgomery
Canada
Lucy Maud Montgomery (November 30, 1874 – April 24, 1942), published as L. M. Montgomery, was a Canadian author best known for a series of novels beginning in 1908 with Anne of Green Gable...
More on Lucy Maud MontgomeryDownload eBooks
Listen/Download Audiobook
Related books
Rilla of Ingleside by Lucy Maud Montgomery
Rilla of Ingleside (1921) is the eighth of nine books in the Anne of Green Gables series by Lucy Maud Montgomery, but was the sixth "Anne" novel in pu...
Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe
Robinson Crusoe is perhaps the most famous castaway of all time. Whilst many of us have not read Defoe’s iconic book, Robinson Crusoe is a character t...
The Golden Age by Kenneth Grahame
The Golden Age was published in 1895. Some of the stories in it had already appeared in various magazines. It was greeted by poets like Swinburne with...
The Junior Classics Volume 9: Stories of To-day by William Patten
The first part of this volume consists of stories by modern writers dealing mainly with life in our own day. They are, of course, meant for the older...
Five Little Peppers and How They Grew by Margaret Sidney
The Five Little Peppers is a book series created by American author Margaret Sidney which was published 1881 to 1916. It covers the lives of the five...
Mother Goose in Prose by L. Frank Baum
Mother Goose in Prose is a collection of twenty-two children's stories based on Mother Goose nursery rhymes. It was the first children's book written...
Elsie Dinsmore by Martha Finley
Elsie Dinsmore is a children's book series written by Martha Finley (1828–1909) between 1867 and 1905. Of Finley's two girls' fiction series, the Mild...
The Snow Queen and Other Stories by Hans Christian Andersen
The story began with a young girl that grew up with a step mom and two sisters. The mother did not like Martha and everyday make her work harder then...
The Magic World by Edith Nesbit
The Magic World is an influential collection of twelve short stories by E. Nesbit. It was first published in book form in 1912 by Macmillan and Co. Lt...
Stories From Wagner by J. Walker McSpadden
Eleven stories of eleven operas by Richard Wagner: Das Rheingold. Die Walküre. Siegfried. Götterdämmerung. Parsifal. Lohengrin. Tannhäuser. Die Me...
Reviews for Rainbow Valley
No reviews posted or approved, yet...