Kilmeny of the Orchard

Kilmeny Gordon cannot speak. She has lived her entire life in the shadow of some old family scandal, sheltered by an aunt and uncle on their Prince Edward Island farm, finding solace only in her violin and the abandoned orchard where she plays. When Eric Marshall arrives in Lindsay to fill in as a substitute teacher, he stumbles upon her there, one girl alone among the apple blossoms, her bow moving across the strings with a haunting, unspoken music. He is instantly captivated. Eric has never been resisted before: handsome, privileged, accustomed to easy victories, he finds in Kilmeny's silence something that refuses him, and wants it more. Their summer deepens into a strange and tender courtship: he learning to read her gestures, she tentatively trusting a world that has only ever shown her rejection. But Kilmeny knows what he does not: the world he will return to has no place for a silent girl from a scandal-touched past. The question becomes not whether he will leave, but whether she will let herself be loved. Montgomery writes with her signature wistfulness here, softer than Anne but aching in different ways, an orchard idyll that understands some people believe they are not made for the happiness they are offered.