Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm by Kate Douglas Wiggin

My favorite aspect of Wiggin’s novel was Rebecca’s character growth. Montgomery’s most iconic heroine, Anne Shirley, then you will probably notice the similarities between her and Wiggin’s Rebecca Randall, although I would argue that Rebecca is a milder mix between Anne Shirley and Emily Starr, another one of Montgomery’s heroines. Her guardians, especially Aunt Miranda, do their best to raise Rebecca into a respectable young lady.

When Rebecca arrives, she is rather plain and unbecoming, but her personality and imagination are quite the opposite. Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm follows the journey of Rebecca Randall as she leaves her family home to live with her two polar opposite aunts. Montgomery’s novels Anne of Green Gables and Emily of New Moon, especially since Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm was published several years beforehand. I was also pretty surprised at the similarities between this novel and L.M. Surprisingly, I had never heard of this novel until very recently, which shocks me because it’s the type of classic young adult novel that I usually gravitate towards. Published 2017 by Post Hypnotic Press (Originally Published 1903)Īlso By This Author: The Bird’s Christmas Carol, Mother Carey’s Chickens Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm by Kate Douglas Wiggin She wins over her aunt soon enough, and the whole town, and thousands of readers and listeners everywhere. She has “a small, plain face illuminated by a pair of eyes carrying such messages, such suggestions, such hints of sleeping power and insight, that one never tired of looking into their shining depths…” To her Aunt Miranda’s continual dismay, Rebecca is exuberant, irrepressible, and spirited – not at all “proper” or “demure”.

Sent to live with her prim and proper Aunt Miranda, who is expecting her much more demure sister, Rebecca is a “bird of a very different feather”. Published in 1903, when girls were inevitably depicted as pretty, gentle and proper, Rebecca Rowena Randall burst onto the scene of children’s literature. Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm has delighted readers for over 100 years.