Series: Daddy-Long-Legs #2
Author: Jean Webster
Genre: Classics, Epistolary, Historical Fiction
Source: Own
My Review:
Dear Enemy is the second in the Daddy-Long-Legs series by Jean Webster. The books need to be read in order for this one to make sense.
While I enjoyed Dear Enemy, it wasn't quite the lark that the first book was. There are parts I liked better, but, overall, this one fell a little short.
Sallie is funny and prone to fits of temper. We see her letters to several people, not just to Judy. We hear a lot about the orphanage asylum and see Sallie and Doctor MacRae's friendship develop.
I wish we could have had some letter from Judy, as I feel this would have rounded out the story nicely. I also wish the ending had not been quite so abrupt.
★★★★/5
Dear Enemy is the sequel to Jean Webster's novel Daddy-Long-Legs. First published in 1915, it was among the top ten best sellers in the US in 1916. The story is presented in a series of letters written by Sallie McBride, Judy Abbott's classmate and best friend in Daddy-Long-Legs. Among the recipients of the letters are Judy; Jervis Pendleton, Judy's husband and the president of the orphanage where Sallie is filling in until a new superintendent can be installed; Gordon Hallock, a wealthy Congressman and Sallie's later fiancé; and the orphanage's doctor, embittered Scotsman Robin 'Sandy' MacRae (to whom Sallie addresses her letters: "Dear Enemy"). Webster employs the epistolary structure to good effect; Sallie's choices of what to recount to each of her correspondents reveal a lot about her relationships with them.
I did love the first book, but I never got around to reading this one. I'm not surprised it isn't quite as good as the first book. Daddy-Long-Legs was so much fun.
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