Seven years after her wedding with Gilbert, Anne visits her old friend Diana Wright and her daughter in Avonlea, following the funeral of Gilbert's father. When she returns home to the old Morgan house, now named "Ingleside", she is greeted by her five children: 'Jem', the eldest, aged seven; Walter Cuthbert, who is about six; twins 'Nan' and 'Di', who are five and look nothing alike; and finally Shirley, two years old and a favorite of their housekeeper Susan. In the next couple of years Anne and Gilbert's youngest child 'Rilla' is born. The novel includes a series of adventures which spotlight Anne's children as they engage in the misunderstandings and mishaps of youth.

Lucy Maud Montgomery (1874-1942) was a Canadian author best known for a series of novels with Anne of Green Gables, an orphaned girl, mistakenly sent to a couple, who had intended to adopt a boy. Anne novels made Montgomery famous in her lifetime and gave her an international following. Most of her novels were set in Prince Edward Island, and locations within Canada's smallest province became a literary landmark and popular tourist site.