Dear Enemy

Have any of you ever read a little book called Daddy-Long-Legs by Jean Webster, grand-niece of Mark Twain? Or, perhaps more likely, have you seen the movie starring Fred Astaire and Leslie Caron?

No, you say?

Yeah, me neither.

But, the other day, I did happen to read the sequel to Daddy-Long-Legs, a lovely little epistolatory novel called Dear Enemy. Although the novel is somewhat blighted by a heavy focus on eugenics, I actually quite enjoyed Webster's style and her main character.

Dear Enemy is the story of a young woman named Sallie McBride who, as a new college graduate (yay women's movement--this novel was published in 1915), agrees to manage an asylum that is refuge to 113 orphans. The novel is a collection of her letters, mostly to her friend Judy (who is apparently the star of Daddy-Long-Legs), recounting her adventures in superintending the orphanage. In the course of a year of living and working at this orphanage, Sallie grows out of her frivolous society ways, drops her politician boyfriend, and becomes an independent New Woman.

All in all, I recommend it. It's fairly humorous and unsentimental for a story about orphans that contains frequent discussions of alcoholism and insanity and includes a scene with a baby in a burning building.

Really, it is.

Enjoy.