A Literary Heroine Has Died

Madeleine L'Engle was a favorite author during my youth. I read and re-read her books obsessively. The Wrinkle in Time books were some of the first science fiction/fantasy I had ever encountered. In later years I even came to have crushes on some of her characters, like Adam and Joshua from The Arm of the Starfish.

As a child of suburban Southern California, I was always fascinated by her depictions of life on the East Coast and exotic locations around the world, as well as by the dynamics of large families. I could not fathom how it would be to have so many siblings! And how it was to live in Manhattan or Connecticut in brownstones and farm houses...I could hardly grasp it, but it was intriguing.

The thing that fascinated me most was how characters crossed over from her two main story groups: Chronos (the Austins) and Kairos (the Murry-O'Keefes). It was the first time I had experienced a writer essentially creating an entire world that spanned multiple books.

I will miss her.