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[Reading Room] Bertie’s New Year by L. M. Montgomery

This is a charming story about good little rich girls being nice to a poor little (good) poverty-stricken boy. The message of the piece is hopelessly outdated (the privileged should be charitable to the deserving poor, who will appreciate it, no strings), but it’s a nice story.

(N.B. I’m by no means opposed to the well-off helping those who’re struggling. I’m just not sure it ever goes as smoothly as it does in this story, and I think…no, never mind. The point is, the way this story unfolds feels very dated. And it is. So, not a crippling criticism).

Anyhoo, the thing that really struck me while reading this, was
how often LM Montgomery did things that my critique group would NEVER let her away with, if she ran the story by them before submitting it to her publisher. And none of them killed the story for me. I still enjoyed it.

So: lesson learned. Write your own story. Listen to critique partners, but don’t worry too much> Opinions are like…well, you know how that goes, right?

Story found via: Short Story Thursdays. You should subscribe, if you don’t already.

 

Read the story online here.

2 thoughts on “[Reading Room] Bertie’s New Year by L. M. Montgomery”

  1. Cool post. I enjoy Lucy Maud’s stories, even as an adult. I find myself rereading a lot of her works that I had explored as a child. I think my favorite book was “Magic for Marigold”. I heard she had played around with a sequel for that one, but it went no where. Or she died before it could happen. I don’t remember really.
    Anyway, you had mentioned that she had wrote things or made mistakes, that your critique group wouldn’t have let her get away with. Out of curiosity and since I’m familiar with her writing style, what are the issues that would not of gone over well with your critique group? Also, I ask because I think I could personally learn, since you group critiques in modern times and I write in modern times.

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