Review Part 2: Pat of Silver Bush by L.M. Montgomery

I finished Pat of Silver Bush the other night! Boy was it heart-wrenching in parts, but mostly just so uplifting and wonderful. Like I’ve said in the first part of this review, Pat’s pure-hearted passion for nature and life just shines through so beautifully. I think she may be one of my top L.M. Montgomery book heroines of all time, but we’ll see how she does in Mistress Pat (the second book in the series.)

Uninteresting, but I seriously hemmed and hawed over starting the second book right now, since it’s my last L.M. Montgomery novel ever (that I know of.) I was considering interrupting the series with her Christmas stories, but I don’t think I can bring myself to it. If you have any suggestions for lovely authors to follow, ideally classic ones, let me know. I’m not a massive Louisa May Alcott fan (sorry!) but love Frances Hodgson Burnett and Laura Ingalls Wilder.

Back to my review. Here are a few examples of what I mean, directly from the book:

“She loved to think of weary and lonely people coming to Silver Bush for rest and food and love.”

“And under everything a sense of deep satisfaction in doing the thing she was meant to do. She tasted it to the full in the beautiful silences which occasionally fell over Silver Bush when every one was quietly busy and the cats basked on the window sills.”

“There was good stuff in the Silver Bush girls. They put duty first always, even in a world which was clamouring that the word was outmoded and the thing to do was to grab what you wanted when you wanted it and let everything else go hang.”

Pat also has a wonderful adoration for trees in particular:

“An occasional breeze set the leaves of the young aspen by the door shaking wildly. Pat loved that aspen. It had grown up unregarded in a few summers … Judy always threatening to cut it down … and then over night it had turned from a shrub into a tree. And then dad had declared it must come down but Pat had interceded successfully.”

It’s made me look at my own garden in a different way. I can see 7 very tall spruces which sort of block my view of the hills beyond a little. I’m starting to like them a bit more as I look at them as Pat-esque ‘people’ so the books are having a lovely effect on me.

In terms of the story arc of the first Pat book, it’s perfect. There is a lovely progression from Pat as a young girl to Pat as a young woman, with both challenges and celebrations mixed in. There is some major drama (like I said above, heart-wrenching!), but also a lot of good stuff. Overall, I’d describe it as wholesome, as with most L.M. Montgomery books and stories. It didn’t completely leave off on a cliff-hanger, but I was excited to delve into the second book in the series all the same. I’m particularly excited to find out what happens between Pat and a certain character – but I won’t spoil that for you.

All in all, this lesser known Montgomery novel is a worthy read. If you’ve already read the Anne series and Emily of New Moon (the second best-known series of Montgomery’s), I’d recommend Pat of Silver Bush next. If you want a break from series, then you can either go down the path of younger reads with Magic for Marigold or slightly older stories with Kilmeny of the Orchard or The Blue Castle.

If you’ve read Pat of Silver Bush, I’d love to hear your thoughts!