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The Wheel of Things: A Biography of Lucy Maud Montgomery
Lucy Maud Montgomery is Canada's best-known writer of children's fiction. Anne of Green Gables -- in print, film, television, on stage--captures people's imaginations as easily now as it did when it burst upon the world in 1908.
Lucy Maud Montgomery grew up in Prince Edward Island and she set her best-loved stories there. She worked briefly as a journalist, but family responsiblities shaped her life as a young single woman. At 36 she married a dour, often depressive Presbyterian minister and moved to Ontario. There she lived a life of contradictions--in private, the romantic, successful imaginative writer; in public the strict, dutiful minister's wife.
Using diaries and letters Lucy Maud never intended to be made public, The Wheel of Things is a pioneering biography of one of Canada's most successful and important writers. Since its publication, the release of Montgomery's diaries and other work by scholarly writers have confirmed the life story that Mollie Gillen tells so well in this important and path-breaking biography.
Lucy Maud Montgomery grew up in Prince Edward Island and she set her best-loved stories there. She worked briefly as a journalist, but family responsiblities shaped her life as a young single woman. At 36 she married a dour, often depressive Presbyterian minister and moved to Ontario. There she lived a life of contradictions--in private, the romantic, successful imaginative writer; in public the strict, dutiful minister's wife.
Using diaries and letters Lucy Maud never intended to be made public, The Wheel of Things is a pioneering biography of one of Canada's most successful and important writers. Since its publication, the release of Montgomery's diaries and other work by scholarly writers have confirmed the life story that Mollie Gillen tells so well in this important and path-breaking biography.
248 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1975
6 people are currently reading
232 people want to read
About the author
Mollie Gillen
19 booksMollie Gillen was born in November 1908 in NSW Australia. She died in January 2009.
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Displaying 1 - 23 of 23 reviews
February 10, 2008
A lovely biography of Anne of Green Gables's Lucy Maud Montgomery. Good details about LMM's life--before, during, and after Anne--and funny anecdotes.
July 13, 2008
I found the writing in this book very scattered. The author draws the same conclusions about "Maud" over and over, attempting to back them up with Maud's own words, but in other passages, there is as much to disprove the auther's opinions as there is to prove them. The best chapter in the book is the one about the huge lawsuit between Maud and her first publisher...and that is because it has the highest percentage of Maud's own writing. Maud, in other words, is a much better storyteller than the biographer. If you're looking for information about how Maud created her characters or what fueled her imagination, aside from the obvious natural charms of PEI, you'll be disappointed.
June 19, 2025
Interesting and informative read. I enjoyed it a lot and learned about the real story of a beloved author. Her life wasn't definitely like her stories, at least with their always happy ending.
February 1, 2012
Maud Montgomery Macdonald was a woman of honor and duty, who wrote of beauty. Gillen's biography of her is well-written and extremely well documented by Montgomery's letters to friends and her journals.
Maud Montgomery was tempestuously emotional while simultaneously being controlled and disciplined. It did take a toll on her, along with her husband's depression. She "mixed" when she didn't want to, was the dutiful minister's wife, and "suffered fools gladly" when she wanted to be alone. She suffered because she was never able to write something of merit as measured by her own internal standard.
My perception of Emily's Quest as a pot-boiler was right on target. Montgomery never wanted to write sequels and the effort she had to make in order to fulfill her publisher's wishes were monumental.
I really admire Lucy Maud Montgomery Macdonald and appreciate Gillen's biographical work immensely.
This book, published by Goodread Biographers, was truly a good read.
Maud Montgomery was tempestuously emotional while simultaneously being controlled and disciplined. It did take a toll on her, along with her husband's depression. She "mixed" when she didn't want to, was the dutiful minister's wife, and "suffered fools gladly" when she wanted to be alone. She suffered because she was never able to write something of merit as measured by her own internal standard.
My perception of Emily's Quest as a pot-boiler was right on target. Montgomery never wanted to write sequels and the effort she had to make in order to fulfill her publisher's wishes were monumental.
I really admire Lucy Maud Montgomery Macdonald and appreciate Gillen's biographical work immensely.
This book, published by Goodread Biographers, was truly a good read.
March 14, 2012
I have read all of the Anne of Green Gables novels many times and love them so I wanted to read more about the author. She didn't marry until she was 36 because she was taking care of her sick Grandmother. Her husband was a minister who suffered from depression and she kept it hidden while writing her books, taking care of her two sons and fulfilling all the duties of a minister's wife. It seems like most of her life she felt like people were holding her back and a lot of the people in her life turned out to be the characters in her books.
October 29, 2024
I have never read a biography of Lucy Maud Montgomery! I know, I'm shocked myself. She is my favorite author after all. This was so well written... Honestly, I felt like she wrote it herself! The style was perfectly hers! I was so surprised that she actually didn't like Anne! That she was sick of writing about her! How crazy!! I was also surprised of her somewhat agnostic approach to God and faith. Disappointing really, she was such a brilliant mind. In any case, it was a very insightful look into the mind and personal life of the author who left us so many enjoyable, timeless books!
January 3, 2016
If you are wanting a general overview of Montgomery's life then this book might do, but I didn't enjoy it. It has been superseded by many subsequent publications, namely Montgomery's Journals and her letters to George Boyd Macmillan and Ephraim Weber. This biography in itself has few unique elements left to enable it to retain any merit.
For anyone who has read all the journals this book has no new insights to offer, and doesn't really capture the spirit of Montgomery or of her life or writings. Reading the journals can be like reading another series of novels - they have a spirit and atmosphere of their own. And they are far more interesting and insightful to read than this book.
The biography has not been well constructed. Montgomery was a writer for most of her life, and a minister's wife for over thirty years of it, and prominent figure for thirty-four years, and there were other significant yet prolonged situations in her life, which were occurring simultaneously. The journals can record that in a way that a biography can't, where it seeks to divide things into neat little sections, and treats themes separately. Thus the narrative of her legal battle with her publisher which consumed many years of her life and was a continual worry and strain upon her, is dealt with briefly in a single chapter. Her husband's health troubles get a few mentions but don't get the same prominence they had in the journals. If you just take one issue at a time, and deal with each in turn, things don't sound too bad. It is only when you see the ongoing daily anguish in the journals, with many differing problems and events overlapping, that you get a clearer picture of what her life was really like.
Any Christian who has read Montgomery's journals or letters will have been able to gather that Montgomery wasn't a Christian herself. This book reinforces that, but the biographer wasn't a Christian either and had no understanding of it, and seemed to rejoice at Montgomery casting aside orthodox belief and presented her as being much better for it. For this reason I would advise all Christian parents to avoid allowing their children to read this particular biography. It wouldn't be helpful to them in the tone it takes and they shouldn't read it until they are mature enough not to be led astray by the beliefs of Montgomery or the attitude of the biographer.
If people do want to read a biography of Montgomery (and have already read, or have no inclination to read, the Journals or volumes of letters to Macmillan and Weber) then I would recommend "The Years Before Anne," by Francis Bolger. It was published before The Wheel of Things but it has retained its usefulness because it contains material which is not to be found in any subsequent publications - her letters to her cousin for example. And it provides useful genealogical information in a way which will enable people to understand how she was related to many of the people whose names appear in her journals. While it is concerned primarily with her life before Anne of Green Gables, there is a brief overview of the rest of her life which I think does a decent job of summing it up, and might inspire one to go and read the Journals.
For anyone who has read all the journals this book has no new insights to offer, and doesn't really capture the spirit of Montgomery or of her life or writings. Reading the journals can be like reading another series of novels - they have a spirit and atmosphere of their own. And they are far more interesting and insightful to read than this book.
The biography has not been well constructed. Montgomery was a writer for most of her life, and a minister's wife for over thirty years of it, and prominent figure for thirty-four years, and there were other significant yet prolonged situations in her life, which were occurring simultaneously. The journals can record that in a way that a biography can't, where it seeks to divide things into neat little sections, and treats themes separately. Thus the narrative of her legal battle with her publisher which consumed many years of her life and was a continual worry and strain upon her, is dealt with briefly in a single chapter. Her husband's health troubles get a few mentions but don't get the same prominence they had in the journals. If you just take one issue at a time, and deal with each in turn, things don't sound too bad. It is only when you see the ongoing daily anguish in the journals, with many differing problems and events overlapping, that you get a clearer picture of what her life was really like.
Any Christian who has read Montgomery's journals or letters will have been able to gather that Montgomery wasn't a Christian herself. This book reinforces that, but the biographer wasn't a Christian either and had no understanding of it, and seemed to rejoice at Montgomery casting aside orthodox belief and presented her as being much better for it. For this reason I would advise all Christian parents to avoid allowing their children to read this particular biography. It wouldn't be helpful to them in the tone it takes and they shouldn't read it until they are mature enough not to be led astray by the beliefs of Montgomery or the attitude of the biographer.
If people do want to read a biography of Montgomery (and have already read, or have no inclination to read, the Journals or volumes of letters to Macmillan and Weber) then I would recommend "The Years Before Anne," by Francis Bolger. It was published before The Wheel of Things but it has retained its usefulness because it contains material which is not to be found in any subsequent publications - her letters to her cousin for example. And it provides useful genealogical information in a way which will enable people to understand how she was related to many of the people whose names appear in her journals. While it is concerned primarily with her life before Anne of Green Gables, there is a brief overview of the rest of her life which I think does a decent job of summing it up, and might inspire one to go and read the Journals.
January 2, 2009
This was really good. But better yet, was Lucy's actual bios (three books in all). She wrote so honestly about her life, marriage, the bittersweet duty of motherhood, and the death of a stillborn son. She did not sound like someone writing in the 1800's. She could have been your best friend that came over for coffee every morning and spoke about the details of life.
May 6, 2013
Shamefully I admit I have never read any of the "Anne" books. However, I do like biographies of strong independent woman and this is a good one!! I am following this up by reading LMM's journals which will be an interesting complement to the great read.
May 15, 2017
An interesting read especially if you have drunk long and deeply of the world of Anne, Emily, et al. Echoes of LMM's life are found in her art, at times, and overall this is a sympathetic portrait. Worth the read!
October 28, 2011
Wish it had been longer with more detail. But a nice introduction to her personality, career, and family life.
February 2, 2013
I am so happy that I read this book. Having always loved Anne of Green Gables, I found a true "kindred spirit" in Maud Montgomery. Very insightfully written.
June 5, 2023
A short biography of L.M. Montgomery. She loved to imagine and write. She wrote stories for magazines which she really didn’t enjoy writing, but did so because it was income. Her true love was writing poetry. Anne of Green Gables started out as a serial story to be published in a newspaper, but then she decided to publish it. Unfortunately for her, the publisher wanted more books, and by the end of the second book, she was tired of Anne, but she continued to spin stories for another six books, hoping that each one would be the last. Raised by strict Presbyterian grandparents (following her mother’s death), as an adult she rebelled against religion yet hid the fact that she did not believe in Jesus’s divinity. Ironically, she married a pastor and was heavily involved in the church and wrote “The Watchman”, a poem about the Resurrection. In a way, L.M. Montgomery’s life seemed like it was as much fiction as her books.
BTW, Anne is not based on Lucy. Emily of the “Emily” books is based on Lucy.
BTW, Anne is not based on Lucy. Emily of the “Emily” books is based on Lucy.
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March 15, 2024This biography gave me a glimpse into the personality and background behind Maud Montgomery’s Anne of Green Gables. In Maud’s life, I found plenty to admire and sympathize with as well as less laudable traits.
The author of this biography weirdly inserted her opinions at times, for instance gloating over Maud shaking off the shackles of conventional religious thinking, and regarding her marriage: “she certainly should not have married him.” Maud had heavy trials in her marriage but there was no evidence she regretted it.
The narrative felt disjointed and the parts of Maud’s life I felt most curious about - including her death seemingly of depression during WWII - were short on details (which very well could be because those are unknown).
In short, I would recommend finding a different biography of L.M Montgomery or just reading her collected letters (which was the main source for much of this book).
The author of this biography weirdly inserted her opinions at times, for instance gloating over Maud shaking off the shackles of conventional religious thinking, and regarding her marriage: “she certainly should not have married him.” Maud had heavy trials in her marriage but there was no evidence she regretted it.
The narrative felt disjointed and the parts of Maud’s life I felt most curious about - including her death seemingly of depression during WWII - were short on details (which very well could be because those are unknown).
In short, I would recommend finding a different biography of L.M Montgomery or just reading her collected letters (which was the main source for much of this book).
March 28, 2021
Let me start by saying what I liked about this book and this will be quite brief as there is very little to admire. I learned a good deal about Maud's life. Gillen has pieced together her life through the letters she exchanged with her friends for many years.
Maud Montgomery (as I learned she wanted to be called)wrote beautiful romantic stories that speak to us a century later. I would hope that anyone aspiring to write her life story would do so in a beautiful manner and capture the magical moments of her life and relate it as a story. Instead, this is a ongoing chain of quotes for Maud's stories and letters. While it may be factually correct, it is uninspiring and disappointing. A Canadian icon deserves a biography that captures her and this fall far short of that.
Maud Montgomery (as I learned she wanted to be called)wrote beautiful romantic stories that speak to us a century later. I would hope that anyone aspiring to write her life story would do so in a beautiful manner and capture the magical moments of her life and relate it as a story. Instead, this is a ongoing chain of quotes for Maud's stories and letters. While it may be factually correct, it is uninspiring and disappointing. A Canadian icon deserves a biography that captures her and this fall far short of that.
June 13, 2023
A decent biography of LMM, that competently highlights the tensions between her inner life and her public persona. Because this was written before the rich trove of selected and complete journals and LMM’s various collections of letters, upon which much of this was based, were published, it omits even darker events, thoughts and feelings exposed by these later sources.
This is a good short bio for those who don’t want a deep dive into either those sources or the much later extensive bio by Mary Rubio who had access to all those.
I find it strange that Gillen didn’t source the quotes she generally uses. Some have complained of the lack of stretch adherence to chronology within each chapter, but I found it suited the focus of each.
This is a good short bio for those who don’t want a deep dive into either those sources or the much later extensive bio by Mary Rubio who had access to all those.
I find it strange that Gillen didn’t source the quotes she generally uses. Some have complained of the lack of stretch adherence to chronology within each chapter, but I found it suited the focus of each.
April 12, 2024
The letters in this biography between Montgomery and two companions added an interesting element. I would cautions fans of Anne of Green Gables who know nothing of L. M. Montgomery before they read this book. Montgomery's life was tremendously difficult. In many ways, knowing about it put a bit of a damper on my beloved Anne series, especially after reading this book and finding out how Montgomery felt about the Anne series.
December 15, 2019
This is a biography about L M Montgomery, the author of Anne of Green Gables. As I knew nothing about her before reading this, I found it informative and interesting and a good starting place for anyone wanting to learn about her. I was interested to know that she lived in Saskatchewan for a time and that she was a pastor’s wife for many years.
December 14, 2025
3,5 stars rounded up
It was interesting to find more about one of my favourite authors but I felt like this biography lacked a bit of structure. The author would jump from topic to topic disregarding any timeline and often repeating things, which made it a little hard to read.
It was interesting to find more about one of my favourite authors but I felt like this biography lacked a bit of structure. The author would jump from topic to topic disregarding any timeline and often repeating things, which made it a little hard to read.
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May 24, 2023DNF my copy is tiny light print and difficult to read; also not very interesting after first few chapters. Very factual and less story telling. A rather boring biography so far.
January 27, 2024
książka się momentami powtarzała, to jedyna moja uwaga a propos tego dzieła
Displaying 1 - 23 of 23 reviews