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A review by chelseyclark
The Alpine Path - The Story of My Career by L.M. Montgomery
2.0
This kind of thing is always hard to review; how do you critique the way someone remembers their life? It's very personal. Thankfully ol' Luce will never read this.
Anyway, I was really looking forward to this book after a trip to Cavendish over the summer, visiting Green Gables and making the walk over to where L. M. Montgomery's house originally stood. The guides there are awesome and extremely knowledgeable, being relations to the author (great great great nephew or something?) and told her story really wonderfully. I picked this up with hopes of filling in some more details, but it was kind of lacklustre.
My main issue was how long this book is - which may seem strange, seeing as it's a tiny little thing. But it really felt like Montgomery was stretching for content, particularly in the last two parts, which she borrows a lot from her own travel journals. This part really didn't entertain me or give much insight into how these travels affected her writing career. It was like she was contracted out for the 10 parts of this book (they were originally published in a series in a newspaper, I think the intro said), and realized she was running out of stuff.
The earlier chapters didn't do much else for me. Her childhood memories were probably nice if you were more into Anne of Green Gables and Montgomery's other works; I feel like they definitely would have given a little insight into some of the real life inspirations for her fictional world. But as a person who hasn't really read any of her work in a good fifteen years or more, I found these recollections a little dull.
The more interesting parts, for me, were the sections Montgomery talked about her initial attempts at getting published and her perseverance when success did not come immediately. Her drive is palpable and makes you want to go out and chase your own aspirations.
The editing on this little piece was pretty horrid; there was some strange punctuation which I found very jarring. The writing itself wasn't awful, nor was it terribly great. So all in all, I'd say fans should give this one a look, but otherwise, give it a pass.
Anyway, I was really looking forward to this book after a trip to Cavendish over the summer, visiting Green Gables and making the walk over to where L. M. Montgomery's house originally stood. The guides there are awesome and extremely knowledgeable, being relations to the author (great great great nephew or something?) and told her story really wonderfully. I picked this up with hopes of filling in some more details, but it was kind of lacklustre.
My main issue was how long this book is - which may seem strange, seeing as it's a tiny little thing. But it really felt like Montgomery was stretching for content, particularly in the last two parts, which she borrows a lot from her own travel journals. This part really didn't entertain me or give much insight into how these travels affected her writing career. It was like she was contracted out for the 10 parts of this book (they were originally published in a series in a newspaper, I think the intro said), and realized she was running out of stuff.
The earlier chapters didn't do much else for me. Her childhood memories were probably nice if you were more into Anne of Green Gables and Montgomery's other works; I feel like they definitely would have given a little insight into some of the real life inspirations for her fictional world. But as a person who hasn't really read any of her work in a good fifteen years or more, I found these recollections a little dull.
The more interesting parts, for me, were the sections Montgomery talked about her initial attempts at getting published and her perseverance when success did not come immediately. Her drive is palpable and makes you want to go out and chase your own aspirations.
The editing on this little piece was pretty horrid; there was some strange punctuation which I found very jarring. The writing itself wasn't awful, nor was it terribly great. So all in all, I'd say fans should give this one a look, but otherwise, give it a pass.