PG16- A House Like a Lotus (b,x)
PG13- A Swiftly Tilting Planet (slight v,some b), Many Waters (a little v,b), The Moon by Night, A Ring of Endless Light (b), An Acceptable Time (some v), The Arm of the Starfish (some v, extremely mild x), Troubling a Star (v)
PG- Meet the Austins, A Wrinkle in Time, A Wind in the Door (maybe b)
I cannot say enough about this woman. She is incredible. She will always be my first favorite author. If there is any other writer in the world who understands kids and teenagers as well, I haven't found him or her.
This is not to say that all of her books are equally good. They're often quite different, so comparing them on that level is a little deceiving. She basically has two families which she follows, but I would like to separate them into three categories: the Austins, the Murrys, and the O'Keefes (most notable Poly). The O'Keefes are the children of Meg Murry and Calvin O'Keefe, who are themselves children during A Wrinkle in Time.
I have read 3 books on the Austins. Meet the Austins is a classic introducing the family and their adopted child. It was a nice book, but it didn't rock my world or anything. However, it does a good job of exploring the feelings in a family after an older child is adopted. I recommend it highly for the pre-teen age group, especially for those who are going through this sort of life change. The overall mood ends positively, but there are a few emotionally upsetting moments. This novel has very little in common with L'Engle's other work, in terms of tone or plot.
The Moon By Night centers on Vicky, the nest-to-oldest child in the family, who is growing up while they travel around the country. The plot of this book ties into the next one and into A House Like a Lotus (about Poly). Vicky is trying to learn how to be a part of her family without losing her new-found individuality. She is also discovering boys. I highly recommend this book for young teenagers, especially those who are "late developers", because Vicky has always lived with that label.
Third, there is A Ring of Endless Light, about Vicky's dying grandfather and the way she learns to cope with her feelings about death. I particularly like this story because we get to see the poet in Vicky, and she is a very good one, able to express in poetry the kinds of things the rest of us keep bottled inside. There is also another encounter with Zachary, the troubled rich kid who haunts both Vicky and Poly (from the O'Keefe series). In a way, Vicky's emotional journey is about re-affirming life in the midst of pressure to give it all up. There are also some great scenes for dolphin-lovers.
Similarly, Troubling a Star is not Science Fiction, but real science written as fiction. Vicky's experiences in New York left her feeling adrift when she returned to her hometown. When Adam's great-aunt gives her a trip to Antarctica as a gift, it seems as though everything is turning around- but which way? Someone keeps threatening her, but Vicky doesn't know anything about politics except that many nations want a piece of Antarctica for themselves, and Adam's long-dead uncle's legacy of foiling them made someone very angry. The descriptions of scenery, animals, and music in this novel are incredible. There are a large number of secondary characters, but they fall into place almost too easily. If Vicky cares about someone, does that make them good? Are her closest friends also her worst enemies? Or is it a deeper evil that has stranded her on an ice flow, slowly waiting to freeze to death? (Don't worry, that's not a spoiler.) If it has feathers, is it a bird or an angel?
There are several books about Meg and her siblings: A Wrinkle in Time, A Wind in the Door, A Swiftly Tilting Planet, and Many Waters. These books are incredible and yet are appropriate to pre-teens or even younger readers. These are especially good for kids who have grown up isolated from their peers in some way.
The award-winning novel A Wrinkle in Time documents Meg and Charles Wallace's search (with the help of friend Calvin) for their missing father. It begins on a stormy night when three women who might almost have been witches tell them about tesseracts, theoretical wrinkles in space. Suddenly they are swept into a race through space and time that will change your whole perception of what good and evil really are. They confront the most beautiful and horrible things any human can imagine, and finally Meg must look even into her own heart to decide what pieces of her are true, and what are right. A classic that every child should read, this story gently changes your mind about what is real, what is good, and what really matters.
Next, A Wind in the Door has Meg desperately trying to save the life of her little brother, Charles-Wallace, as he fights off an infection caused by the ultimate evil- denial of existence. She learns the meaning of friendship, sacrifice, and what a gift it is to be alive, even as she tries to beat the mind games of the evil X. Though this novel is not as much a classic as A Wrinkle in Time, I enjoyed it just as much. The form that evil takes is different in "Wind", so it is not just a repeat of "Wrinkle".
A Swiftly Tilting Planet shifts perspectives to that of a slightly older Charles-Wallace, who, with the help of a strong-willed unicorn, must fight through a multitude of quantum universes to keep his own alive. Though this novel shifts temporally and spacially and works through more complicated themes than the last two, the style is so clear that a pre-teen could still understand the action. This is probably the only book in the world that expains the quantum theory of multiple universes in terms that an intelligent 12-year-old could understand.
Finally, Many Waters switches again to the twins, Sandy and Dennys, who ride virtual unicorns into the distant past, where they meet Noah and find him building a giant boat. But no one else in the village will listen to Noah, for some of them are under the influence of the fallen angels. The one who tries to change their minds is Noah's beautiful daughter, who is a friend of the Cherubim. In a time when virtual unicorns race through the desert, manticores are not imaginary, griffins are not extinct, and angels walk the earth in human and animal form, what is the purpose of the two strange, pale boys? And will all those not named by God perish in the flood- even Noah's daughter?
My favorite book by L'Engle is A House Like a Lotus, about Meg's daughter Poly. As the oldest of seven children going to a poor public school after being homeschooled for a long time, Poly often feels like she has no room for herself. So when she befriends a fascinating woman living on the other end of her home island, she is happy to have somewhere to go for a little peace and quiet. Yet what she finds is a close friend, and pain, and a chance to explore the world and her own heart. The book actually begins with her at the airport in Greece, en route to Cyprus, and her time at home comes through in flashbacks. The two stories interweave nicely as Poly works through her past, trying to find healing and the strength to forgive. The novel also explores the often painful nature of discovering sexuality.
The next book that stars Poly is An Acceptable Time, in which she, like her uncles before her, is sucked into the past. Her fate is to unlock the mystery of blue-eyed Native Americans who lived in her area, and the war between two groups. Two friends of her mother's come to help her, adding even more confusion to the pot, and one group of natives declares that Polly is a sacrifice given from the gods- and that she must die.
Poly makes another appearance in The Arm of the Starfish, a very old and probably out of print introduction to the character of Adam, the biology student who works with both the O'Keefes and Vickie Austin. Adam is overjoyed when he gets the chance, as an undergraduate, to work with the famous Dr. O'Keefe off the coast of Portugal for a summer. But then he meets Kali Cutter, a beautiful, wealthy girl who takes an interest in him. He is plunged into the world of scientific espionage and is forced to decide who the good guys are and whether he is willing to sacrifice everything, including his friends and his own life, to stand up for what he believes. This novel is one of L'Engle's few from a male perspective, but it is extremely well written and believable. The setting is the early 1960's or so, during some of the worst Cold War tensions. The plot is tight, though predictable in some places (deliberately so, I think), while the dialogue and description are wonderful. A recommended book for young adults or even slightly older adults ^_^.
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Last Updated: October 4, 1999
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