My love for times and eras gone by and everything beautiful, in general, makes me pickup so many books just for their covers. ‘The Road to Yesterday’ is one such book that has a pretty cover illustration but it wasn’t just the cover that made me pick it up. The name Lucy Maud Montgomery means a lot to me. It means getting lost in those charming old-world villages which are surrounded by beautiful scenery and delightful people. Something always seems to be going on in such places and takes you far away from your existing world. I consider such ‘mental breaks’ very necessary for the mind to relax. I had these expectations in mind when buying ‘The Road to Yesterday’, a quick glance at the back cover seemed to confirm it and now that I have read the book, I am so glad I did.

The book comprises of several short stories that you may, if you wish to, read separately. But the fact that they are all related to each other in more than one ways, makes it advisable to read them all together as you would read a complete novel. The stories are all set in a small village - Glen St. Mary’s - in Canada and all stories have repeated mentions of the same places and people. The Blythes who are a respectable couple are mentioned in every story and you will find references to names of persons, places and events from the other stories in every story. These ’stories’ are really incidents and events that happen to different households of the same neighborhood which is what makes them seem seamless from the first page of the book to the last. I was reading the reviews of some other readers and was surprised to find that they found the continuous reference to the Blythes and other common references ‘annoying’. I will have to disagree with them here and speak out my own opinion for you. It was this particular style of the author’s writing that made me love the book. It is this common thread that weaves the stories together and you never seem to go out of the beautiful world created within the charming village and it’s lively people.

The stories or rather incidents that happen to different people or households living in the same village are almost all very dear to my heart and have something for everyone in them. Romantics will find a lot of romance and beautiful scenery described, homemakers will find a lot of details  on gardening and cooking and families will find so much to do with parenting. The innocent kids, unmarried ‘old maids’, young hearts, old men content or discontent with their lives, married couples devoted to each other and gossipy housekeepers all make this village bustling with activity and one you would never want to step out. There is so much to laugh at and so much to cry for.

The book starts with a poem ‘Canadian Twilight’ which sets a beautiful canvas for the rest of the imagery. The stories ‘An Afternoon with Mr. Jenkins’, ‘The Cheated Child’ and ‘The Twins Pretend’ bring out the innocence and playfulness of children and will be loved by parents or anyone who had had anything to do with kids. ‘Penelope Struts Her Theories’ will bring a good laugh for all moms reading the book and most of them will identify with her. I know I did! ‘The Pot and the Kettle’, ‘Fancy’s Fool’ and ‘The Road to Yesterday’ are feel-good young romance stories that are always liked. ‘Fool’s Errand’, ‘A Dream Come True’, ‘The Reconciliation’ and ‘Retribution’ are a lovely read for middle ages and have a lot of freshness in them. I cried at one point reading ‘A Commonplace Woman’ and would have wished the story to be included somewhere in the middle instead of at the end of the book. I would love to have closed the book smiling like I did after so many stories contained within.

‘Brother Beware’ is an amusing story and if you think hard, you might be able to identify with it if you are a woman. You will know what I mean when you read it yourself. I had a broad smile playing over my lips as I read it to the end. I was thinking of my own courtship period with my DH when we were in college. I was trying hard not to laugh when I thought of the look on his face when I told him that I had known for the past one year that he loved me and was going to propose to me. He had been even more bewildered to find out that I had the same feelings for him all along. He admitted later that he had felt like a fool then. Well, all women are like that I know that men secretly love the way women ‘ill-use’ them and ‘make fools out of them’. That is the very beginning of love, isn’t it?