4. Anne of Ingleside

4. Anne of Ingleside. L.M. Montgomery. 1939. 274 pages. [Source: Bought] [3 stars, audio book, classic]

First sentence: "How white the moonlight is tonight!" said Anne Blythe to herself, as she went up the walk of the Wright garden to Diana Wright's front door, where little cherry-blossom petals were coming down on the salty, breeze-stirred air.

Anne of Ingleside was L.M. Montgomery's last (published) novel. In the novel, she is revisiting her most beloved heroine, Anne. The novel opens with Anne visiting Avonlea in the spring of 1900; she is pregnant with Rilla. She is spending time with Marilla and Mrs. Lynde, of course, and making time to spend one whole day with Diana. If memory serves, Diana is not really mentioned again in the series (Rainbow Valley, Rilla of Ingleside). After a short visit, she returns to her own home, her waiting family. There is Gilbert, of course, and Susan Baker, and her five children: Jem, Walter, Nan and Di (the twins), and Shirley. The book, I believe, mentions around here that she's been married nine years and her oldest is seven. Imagine five children under the age of seven with one more on the way! So Anne is extremely fortunate to have Susan helping her with all those children! There is one person Anne isn't looking forward to seeing, Gilbert's Aunt Mary Maria. She comes for "two weeks" and stays over a year! The chapter on how they accidentally send her off is one of my favorites!!!

The narration of Anne of Ingleside is interesting. Readers spend time inside the minds of Anne, Jem, Walter, Di, Nan, Rilla, and perhaps Susan. I don't recall Gilbert or Shirley or Aunt Mary Maria! Montgomery devoted a certain amount of time to each child. These chapters capture different aspects of being a child, different fears and anxieties, different hopes and dreams. There is Jem's one desire for a dog who really truly loves him. There is Di's friendship troubles, I believe. Nan has a chapter about bargaining with God. My least favorite chapter, unfortunately, is near the end. Anne loses touch with reality and thinks Gilbert doesn't love her anymore and that he regrets marrying her. Seriously I'm not sure what Montgomery was thinking with this one!

I read this one trying to always keep in mind that this book serves as a goodbye. The original Anne audience would have been born circa 1895-1900. The first book was published in 1908. The last book was published in 1939. Those that grew up with Anne would have been able to introduce their children to Anne as well! Anne may have felt like a kindred spirit indeed, as her original audience was reaching their mid-to-late teens, Anne was falling in love and getting married. (Anne of the Island was published 1915. Anne's House of Dreams was published in 1917.) The following books, which focus on her raising a family. Rainbow Valley and Rilla of Ingleside were published in 1919 and 1921. This was "the" Anne series for almost fifteen years. Anne of Windy Poplars was published in 1936 and Anne of Ingleside in 1939.

When I first wrote this review in 2013, I am not sure I was aware of how L.M. Montgomery ended her life. This greatly saddens me. AND I can't help wishing for one more visit with Anne and her family. To see Anne as a grandmother--to see her children grown, married, with children of her own. Perhaps gathering the grandchildren around to tell them stories, to hear their stories. Or perhaps to take nature walks with them. I could imagine scenes where young children want to hear more, more, more of her stories.

As for rating this book, it's hard. There are chapters I absolutely LOVE. There are chapters I merely like or tolerate. There are chapters that seem to flow EASILY together--those near the start of the novel. And then others feel like added on vignettes. I do wish more time had been spent on ALL the children. We get a lot of Nan and Di with a few of Jem. But not as many for Walter or Shirley or Rilla.

Favorite quotes:

The only time I feel I'm getting along a bit is when I look at pictures in the magazines. The heroes and heroines in them are beginning to look too young to me. 

We'll enjoy each other's friendship today even if we are to be parted tomorrow. 

Our friendship has always been a very lovely thing, Diana.
Yes...and we've always...I mean...I never could say things like you, Anne, but we have kept our old 'solemn' vow and promise' haven't we?
Always...and always will.
Anne's hand found its way into Diana's. They sat for a long time in a silence too sweet for words. 

It was never quite safe to sit down on a chair at Ingleside without first making sure there wasn't a cat in it. 

This is no common day, Mrs. Dr. dear, she said solemnly.
Oh, Susan, there is no such thing as a common day. Every day has something about it no other day has. Haven't you noticed?

Half an hour later, Susan, reading her nightly chapter in her Bible, came across the verse, "Withdraw thy foot from thy neighbor's house lest he weary of thee and hate thee." She put a sprig of southernwood in it to mark the spot. Even in those days, she reflected.

If a minister preaches a sermon that hits home to some particular individual people always suppose he meant it for that very person, said Anne. A hand-me-down cap is bound to fit somebody's head but it doesn't follow that it was made for him.

I do not think, Mrs. Marshall Elliott, that people in these parts say half the things they are reported to have said.

© 2026 Becky Laney of Becky's Book Reviews

3. Into the Fire (Westfallen #2)

3. Westfallen #2: Into the Fire. Ann and Ben Brashares. 2025. 384 pages. [Source: Library] [5 stars, series book, mg speculative fiction]

First sentence: IF at first you don't succeed, cry cry again.

Premise/plot: Into the Fire is the second book in the Westfallen series by brother-and-sister authors, Ben and Ann Brashares. The premise is AWESOME. Three friends from the present (2023) "meet" three friends from the past (1944) and history is changed FOREVER-forever. (Or is it?!?!?!) Henry, Lukas, and Frances were at one time best, best, best friends though in recent years they've grown apart--far apart. Alice, Lawrence, and Artie are friends as well. These six friends become connected by a radio.

In the first book, loose lips from the future changes the past. They make an attempt to fix it for sure, but, that attempt is unsuccessful. America [and the Allies] lost the Second World War. Bad news all around.

The six kids working together--though NOT by magic radio--try time and time and time again to change the future by changing the past. That is the kids from 2023 are searching for clues in a future where they are strangers--strangers in a strange land if you will--to see WHAT events in 1944 led to this terrible, horrible future. IT is a mystery. The kids in the past are trying their best to look for clues too. To be careful and observant. To look for anything off--signs of treason within their neighborhood. WHO is it among them that would communicate with the BAD bad guys.

Will the future be changed? Almost four hundred pages of MORE attempts...is there any progress?!?!?!

My thoughts: I read the first book TWICE. It was awesome. It was thrilling and chilling. Did not disappoint. This second book is equally intense. Same premise BUT with an added layer of dystopia. The world-building IS intriguing--and terrifying. I do think some readers--perhaps older readers???--will piece together clues before the kids in the story. I did want to shout at the characters a few times. Did I expect a cliff hanger ending? I didn't. And that's probably all my own fault. I read this book in two or three sittings BECAUSE I thought at last, at last, at last RESOLUTION. There is no resolution. WAS it a great read? YES for the most part. At least as good as the first book. Perhaps I'm more invested for the second book. I want the third book NOW, NOW, NOW, NOW.


© 2026 Becky Laney of Becky's Book Reviews

2. Fahrenheit 451 (audiobook)

    

2. Fahrenheit 451. Ray Bradbury. 1953/2011. 194 pages. [Source: Library][5 stars, audiobook, dystopia, science fiction, adult classic]

ETA: The narrator was Penn Badgley. I absolutely love, love, love this science fiction classic. I thought I'd read it more recently than 2022, but, apparently not!

First sentence: It was a pleasure to burn.

Premise/plot: Guy Montag, a fireman, is challenged in his beliefs after meeting a young neighbor girl, Clarisse, who is seventeen and crazy. Though their meetings are brief--she dies soon after--his life is forever changed by the act of actually thinking, observing, engaging.

Guy Montag has his eyes opened--and once they are open--he's quick to see that his society is in BIG, BIG TROUBLE and that most likely it is DOOMED, heading straight for collapse.

My thoughts: Fahrenheit 451 is one of my all-time favorite, favorite, favorite, favorite books. It's not about censorship--not really. Despite what any back cover says.

There is a line in a song from Beauty and the Beast that tackles what this one is about.

Gaston: Lefou, I'm afraid I've been thinking.
Lefou: A dangerous pastime,
Gaston: I know.

It is a nightmarish look at what happens to an entire civilization/culture that embraces the philosophy that IGNORANCE IS BLISS. That a mindless life is a happy life. It shows us the results of several generations CHOOSING for THEMSELVES not to think--to just be entertained quick and easy, fast and mindless. That's why I said it is NOT about censorship. Except for the occasional "oddball" that hasn't been brainwashed by the education system, the parlor families (aka television), the ads and billboards, the majority are happy and content to be mindless. They're not desperate rebels anxious to pick up a book. They don't need the government, the system, the powers that be forbidding them from picking up books and reading. It's almost a non-issue. It's the oddballs that keep the firemen in business.

Mindless, easy entertainment that never challenges or questions--merely entertains has weakened society. Though most wouldn't ever guess it or observe it on their own. They're doomed and clueless.

In addition to entertainment and education (or lack thereof) this one also has MUCH to say about war.

Favorite quotes:

I heard once that a long time ago houses used to burn by accident and they needed firemen to stop the flames. (8)

Sometimes I'm ancient. I'm afraid of children my own age. They kill each other. Did it always use to be that way? My uncle says no. Six of my friends have been shot in the last year alone. (30)

"People don't talk about anything."
"Oh, they must!"
"No, not anything. They name a lot of cars or clothes or swimming pools mostly and say how swell! But they all say the same things and nobody says anything different from anyone else..." (31)

"We need not to be let alone. We need to be really bothered once in a while. How long is it since you were really bothered? About something important, about something real?" (52)

Do you see? Out of the nursery into the college and back to the nursery; there's your intellectual pattern for the past five centuries or more. (55)

School is shortened, discipline relaxed, philosophies, histories, languages dropped, English and spelling gradually neglected, finally almost completely ignored (55)

Who knows who might be the target of the well-read man? Me? I won't stomach them for a minute. Remember, Montag, we're the happiness boys. We stand against the small tide of those who want to make everyone unhappy with conflicting theory and thought. (58)

It didn't come from the Government down. There was no dictum, no declaration, no censorship, to start with, no! Technology, mass exploitation, and minority pressure carried the trick, thank God. Today thanks to them you can stay happy all the time. (58)

Ask yourself, What do we want in this country, above all? People want to be happy, isn't that right right? Haven't you heart it all your life? I want to be happy, people say. Well, aren't they? Don't we keep them moving, don't we give them fun? That's all we live for, isn't it? For pleasure, for titillation? And you must admit our culture provides plenty of these. (59)

The home environment can undo a lot you try to do at school. That's why we've lowered the kindergarten age year after year until now we're almost snatching them from the cradle. (60)

Did you listen to him? He knows all the answers. He's right. Happiness is important. Fun is everything. (65)

"We cannot tell the precise moment when friendship is formed. As in filling a vessel drop by drop, there is at last a drop which makes it run over; so in a series of kindnesses there is at last one which makes the heart run over." (71)

Every hour so many damn things in the sky! How in hell did those bombers get up there every single second of our lives! Why doesn't someone want to talk about it! We've started and won two atomic wars since 1990! Is it because we're having so much fun at home we've forgotten the world? Is it because we're so rich and the rest of the world's so poor and we just don't care if they are? Is that why we're hated so much? Do you know why? I don't, that's sure! Maybe the books can get us half out of the cave. God, Millie, don't you see? An hour a day, two hours, with these books, and maybe. (73-4)

Good God, it isn't as simple as just picking up a book you laid down half a century ago. Remember, the firemen are rarely necessary. The public itself stopped reading of its own accord. (78)

It’s been a long time. I’m not a religious man. But it’s been a long time.’ Faber turned the pages, stopping here and there to read. ‘It’s as good as I remember. Lord, how they’ve changed it in our parlors these days. Christ is one of the family now. I often wonder if God recognizes His own son the way we’ve dressed him up, or is it dressed him down? He’s a regular peppermint stick now, all sugar-crystal and saccharine when he isn’t making veiled references to certain commercial products that every worshiper absolutely needs.’ (81)

I’m one of the innocents who could have spoken up and out when no one would listen to the ‘guilty’, but I did not speak and thus became guilty myself. (82)

It’s not the books you need, it’s some of the things that were once in books. (82)

The magic is only in what books say, how they stitched the patches of the universe together into one garment for us. (83)

And what does the word quality mean ? To me it means texture. This book has pores. It has features. This book can go under the microscope. You’d find life under the glass, streaming past in infinite profusion. The more pores, the more truthfully recorded details of life per square inch you can get on a sheet of paper, the more literary you are. That’s my definition anyway. Telling detail. Fresh detail. The good writers touch life often. The mediocre ones run a quick hand over her. The bad ones rape her and leave her for the flies. (83)

We are living in a time when flowers are trying to live on flowers, instead of growing on good rain and black loam. (83)

The books are to remind us what asses and fools we are. (86)

"Caesarians or not, children are ruinous; you're out of your mind," said Mrs. Phelps.
"I plunk the children in school nine days out of ten. I put up with them when they come home three days a month; it's not bad at all. You heave them into the 'parlor' and turn the switch. It's like washing clothes: stuff laundry in and slam the lid." Mrs. Bowles tittered. "They'd just as soon kick as kiss me. Thank God, I can kick back!" (96)

Mistakes can be profited by. Man, when I was younger I shoved my ignorance in people's faces. They beat me with sticks...if you hide your ignorance, no one will hit you and you'll never learn. (104)

What traitors books can be! You think they're backing you up, and they turn on you. (107)

Oh God, the terrible tyranny of the majority. (108)

© 2026 Becky Laney of Becky's Book Reviews

Week in Review #1

 In the last days of 2025, I did review two books and a Bible. I also watched a handful of movies. However, I've decided to just include the ones reviewed and/or watched in 2026 proper.

I DID review one book this week. (My numbers can only go up from here!) That one book is THE LONG WINTER by Laura Ingalls Wilder. This is a fabulous, fabulous read. I listened on audio book. I do recommend listening to the series on audio because of the fiddle bits. Every time there is a song--where Pa plays his fiddle--there's FIDDLE. It does immerse you more in the story which is lovely. This one is best read UNDER a blanket or two.

Century of Viewing Week #1

1960s

• 1962 Music Man Is The Music Man my absolute and favorite musical?!?!?! Probably. Maybe. Definitely top three if not the top slot. A traveling sales man sells the town on boys' band, but, his less than honest past may catch up with him before the end. But the love of a GOOD librarian may just lead to the best resolution of all.
• 1967 Camelot. My second one-star movie of the year is CAMELOT (the musical). It had probably been three decades since I last saw it. I had a vague memory of some of the songs. And curiosity enough to rewatch it. Camelot is not made for an overthinker like me. IF I'd watched it in the daytime, I'd have probably had words with the screen. As everyone was sleeping, I had to keep my loud thoughts quiet. (Or quieter.)

1980s

• 1982 Ivanhoe THE one and only. THE best way to start New Year's Day. This Swedish tradition of watching Ivanhoe on New Year's Day is all kinds of awesome. I just had to borrow the tradition once my friend "Anonymous L" shared about it. THE story is full of action, adventure, and ROMANCE. Love, love, love this one so much.
• 1987 Overboard How many people go overboard in this romantic comedy? Quite a few--but many are repeats. This comedy is delightful--a bit over the top...dare I say a bit overboard. HOWEVER, I think this prank soon becomes oh-so-real as feelings get involved. I love how this found family saves her.

1990s

• 1995 While You Were Sleeping. I started this one a few days ago. It's a great movie to watch in between Christmas and New Year's Day. It's SO quotable and funny and enjoyable. Just a delight to watch this romantic comedy that is quirky and family-focused.

2020s

• 2020 We Three Kings. This is a bio pic, a period drama, a movie based on true events. It is about how the Christmas Carol "We Three Kings" was written. In theory, it shouldn't be *that* bad a movie. I don't know if it's the actors fault for not being great actors, or the fault of those who cast this movie in the first place, or perhaps the fault is the writers. THE costumes are lovely. But the acting and/or the writing is very stilted, unnatural, awkward. The writing does have a lot of info-dumping.

 

© 2026 Becky Laney of Becky's Book Reviews

1. The Long Winter (Audiobook)

1. The Long Winter (Little House #6) Laura Ingalls Wilder. 1940. 334 pages. [Source: Library][audiobook, historical fiction, classic]

 First sentence: The mowing machine's whirring sounded cheerfully from the old buffalo wallow south of the claim shanty, where bluestem grass stood thick and tall and Pa was cutting it for hay.

Premise/plot: The Ingalls family--and the whole community/territory--face a brutal, harsh, and terribly long winter full of blizzards. 

This first chapter is called "Make Hay While the Sun Shines" and if it's found within a book called THE LONG WINTER, the reader knows what to expect even if the characters don't. The book opens with Ma and Pa and family getting ready for harvest and winter. Laura is helping out Pa. Mary and Carrie are helping out Ma. Laura is especially pleased that she's old enough (around 14 now) to help Pa and do outdoor chores.

The Ingalls family is living in their claim shanty. This would be the first fall/winter they've been there. And they know it will be tough, but when the first blizzard comes in October, they know that it wouldn't only be tough to survive but impossible to survive if they were to try to stay on their homestead. Fortunately, Pa owns property in town. A place where they can be nice and warm and cozy for the winter. Or so they think.

What no one could know is just how hard, how long, how tough this winter was going to be. Some folks are prepared--the Wilder boys for instance--but most are not. Most are relying on the train making regular stops in town. The trains are essential for stocking the stores of supplies. But when almost every day brings a blizzard--with clear days coming only one at a time and never on a predictable schedule--it soon becomes clear that the trains will not be saving the day. Not til spring. The town's survival, the Ingalls' family survival, is a big if at this point.

Cold. Hunger. Starvation. No supplies. What's not to love?

My thoughts: The Long Winter has always been one of my favorites of the Little House series. I'll admit it tends to make you cold and hungry. But that's not a bad thing, right? I didn't think so. Only two books can trick my mind and body--okay maybe three--into thinking it's cold and hungry. One, of course, is The Long Winter. The other two are by Susan Beth Pfeffer. I think one of the reasons I love The Long Winter is that it introduces Almanzo Wilder onto the scene. True, there was Farmer Boy, but not every reader takes the time to read Farmer Boy. I spent forty plus years avoiding it. I read it earlier this year for the first time. But this Almanzo is a man--a young man it's true--19 years of age. And he's acting "manly" alright when it's time to save the day. I love every scene Almanzo is in. Laura first meets him when she's lost and trying to find her Pa in the slough of hay. Here is the description: "His blue eyes twinkled down at her as if he had known her a long time." Anyway, I love this book.

Is it my favorite and best from the series? Probably. I do love These Happy Golden Years. So those two are my favorite and best. But I really LOVE, LOVE, LOVE this one so much.

ETA: I listened to The Long Winter--a book I've read dozens of times--on audio narrated by Cherry Jones. The audio book is a little over seven hours.


© 2026 Becky Laney of Becky's Book Reviews