A Tangled Web, L.M. Montgomery’s eighteenth book, was published in October 1931 by McClelland & Stewart and Frederick A. Stokes Company. It appeared in the UK as Aunt Becky Began It.
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Contents
About A Tangled Web Dedication Chapters Editions of A Tangled Web Adaptations of A Tangled Web Reviews of A Tangled Web
About A Tangled Web
A Tangled Web begins when Aunt Becky Dark, matriarch of the extended Dark-Penhallow clan, gathers her numerous family members together before her death to announce her plans for the inheritance of an ugly but much coveted jug; after her death, a number of characters make abrupt changes in their lives and their habits in the hopes of being chosen as the jug’s new owner.
Dedication
To
my good friends
Mr. and Mrs. Fred W. Wright
in memory of
a certain week of laughter
Chapters
I. Aunt Becky’s Levee
II. Wheels Within Wheels
III. Midsummer Madness
IV. The Moving Finger
V. Blindly Wise
VI. Finally, Brethren
Editions of A Tangled Web
McClelland and Stewart (Toronto) published the first Canadian edition of A Tangled Web in 1931. Later McClelland and Stewart editions included a Cavendish Library edition in 1947, a Canadian Favourites edition in 1972, and a new edition in 1989.
Frederick A. Stokes Company (New York) published the first U.S. edition of A Tangled Web in 1931. It is identical to the first Canadian edition. Stokes licensed reprint editions to A.L. Burt Company (New York) and Grosset and Dunlap (New York).
Hodder and Stoughton (London) published the first UK edition of Aunt Becky Began It in 1931.
Angus and Robertson (Sydney) published the first Australian edition of A Tangled Web in 1931.
Reviews of A Tangled Web
Reviews of A Tangled Web that have been located so far appeared in periodicals from Australia, Canada, South Africa, the United Kingdom, and the United States.
Volume 3 of The L.M. Montgomery Reader includes the full text of eight reviews of A Tangled Web.
“A Tangled Web is a decided change from L.M. Montgomery’s usual style of romance so much beloved by her large Canadian public. Though the action takes place in the usual delightful surroundings of small town life in lovely Prince Edward Island, the author has given us in flowing language a robust and versatile clan saga in which a vast number of Darks and Penhallows mingle in a kaleidoscopic mixture of colors and variety. . . . Prince Edward Island lies before us in all the beauty of color, sound and surging shores, and the wealth of local color and the quaint personalities of village life are a charm alike to sophisticated and simple readers.”
—The Toronto Telegram
“An ambitious, humorous and fascinating piece of work. . . . To this author we accord the same honor we give to a Galsworthy—that of keeping separate and individualistic each of the sixty members of his entire kit. An achievement too dizzying for our feeble mentality to comprehend how it can be done.”
—Public Ledger (Philadelphia)
“Miss Montgomery, no doubt, in this story, gives ample play to her plot-contriving powers. The interest is magnetically held, and the reader is kept in a continual state of excitement; no sooner does she create a happy-ever-after atmosphere, than the premature conclusion is enigmatically dissolved, and the reader is left to guess again.”
—Sydney Church Standard (Australia)