The narrative was developed from the novels of Lucy Maud Montgomery, following the previous success of Sullivan Entertainment’s miniseries adaptation of Montgomery’s best-known novel, Anne of Green Gables. Set in the Atlantic province of Prince Edward Island (P.E.I.) in the first decades of the 20th century, Avonlea opens with the move of young Sara Stanley (Sara Polley) from Montreal to the small P.E.I. town of Avonlea to live with two aunts, Hetty King (Jackie Burroughs) and Olivia King (Mag Ruffman). Over the seven seasons, the narrative traces the coming of age of Sara and the other children of the town as well as the adjustments of the adults in the community to the increasing changes that 20th-century modernization brings to rural island life. The series is situated simultaneously within the genres of period-costume drama and children’s, or family, drama—on the CBC, the series ran in the 7:00 P.M. family hour.

The dramatic formula for the series was relatively stable. Episode plots built upon the development of the children’s interrelationships and their increasing entrance into the “adult” world of family and community life. At the same time, the shape of the community was developed through the interactions of series regulars with “outsiders” who instigated disruptions into both family and kinship ties, and who served as indices of the invasive modernity encroaching on town life. The dramatic formula therefore intertwined the coming-of-age incidents and the character development of a traditional children’s series with an idealized and nostalgic accounting of rural forms of community life. The fact that the series’ narrative ends on the eve of World War I serves to reinforce this linking of childhood, family, and community in an earlier, more innocent period.

The episodic use of outsider characters also integrated well with the series development in relation to both domestic and foreign markets. Over the years the producers succeeded in recruiting for these roles a number of internationally known Canadian guest stars (for example, Kate Nelligan, Colleen Dewhurst) and international guest stars (Michael York, Stockard Channing), a production decision that greatly aided in the international marketing of the series. Road to Avonlea, therefore, is a prime example of the adaptation of a national popular culture narrative to the constraints of the international television culture of the 1990s. At the same time, it demonstrates one possible strategy for series finance within relatively “small” national television industries.