Feature & Follow Friday #17

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Feature & Follow Friday is a weekly social blog hop between book bloggers. There are two regular hosts: Parajunkee and Alison of Alison Can Read, and two special guest hosts every week. If you want to join in, click on either of their blogs to get the details. The FF question of the day is: 

Q: Have you had a character that disappointed you? One that you fell in love with and then "broke up" with later on in either the series or a stand-alone book? 

My character is from my childhood: Anne (of Green Gables). I loved that series so much. When Montgomery shifted the focus away from Anne and onto Anne's children, I was really disappointed.  It felt like Anne became a mother, and therefore she was no longer the central character in her series. (Book Snob has a killer post that describes the arc in detail.) I understand that focusing on child protagonists makes sense for a series geared towards children. But I was so emotionally invested in Anne's life that I wanted to read about her adulthood, even though I was still a child. 

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So, no break up. Anne just faded out of my life, and planted a tiny seed of suspicion that when you become a mother, you have to stop being a brave, bright, kindred spirit heroine. Of course, Montgomery was writing in a different time, and societal perceptions have changed drastically. But the ideas in a children's book feel current to the child reading, no matter how long ago it was published.

I wish that Anne was allowed to mature and deepen while still staying true to herself as the central character through her series, instead of becoming boring and invisible. I like to imagine that somewhere in an alternate universe, the second half of the "Anne of Green Gable" series allows Anne to have thrilling adventures with her children and grandchildren. Anne deserved that, and so did we.