Candy Candy

Candy Candy (キャンディ・キャンディ, Kyandi Kyandi) is a Japanese historical romance novel, manga, and anime series. The main character, Candice "Candy" White Audrey is a blonde girl with freckles, large emerald green eyes and long, curly hair, worn in pigtails with bows. Candy Candy first appeared in a prose novel by famed Japanese writer Keiko Nagita under the pen name Kyoko Mizuki in April 1975. When Mizuki joined forces with manga artist Yumiko Igarashi, the Japanese magazine Nakayoshi became interested in Candy Candy. The series was serialized as a manga series in the magazine for four years and won the 1st Kodansha Manga Award for shōjo in 1977. The story was adapted into an anime series by Toei Animation. There are also four animated short films.

Plot

The Candy Candy manga provides a "coming of age story" in the shōjo genre. Candy, an abandoned orphan taken in by the orphanage Pony's Home near Lake Michigan around the start of the 20th century, spent the first years of her life at the orphanage, to where she would often return to repose and to decide her next course in life. When Annie, her best friend at the orphanage, was adopted, she ran outside crying, and met briefly a young man in kilt who told the child not to cry. Candy retained fond memories of the young man and, not knowing his name, remembered him as her "Prince on the Hill". The young man will have great influence and importance in her life later on.