Takeaway: Interesting how preconceptions affect the reading of a story.
It is odd to read a book for the first time as an adult, when you started the series as a pre-teen. Like Many Waters, this has a very different feel from the first three books of the series. It is actually the fifth book of the Wrinkle in Time Series and the fourth book in the Polly O’Keefe series.
Time is erratic in L’Engle’s books. The books in both series cannot easily be pinned down to a particular time or even easily be pinned down to fit into one another.
My biggest complaint is that the father/grandfather (Alex Murray, the father in the first four books and the grandfather in this book) is wildly different from what I think he was in the other books. He seems self centers and a bit of a prick.
How can a man that was held on another world for months, one that has dedicated his life to time and space travel be so skeptical about his granddaughter and friend traveling in time? Maybe Charles Wallace and the twins did not share with him about their own time traveling. But Alex Murray traveled to other worlds and took seriously Mrs O’Keefe and her ancient runes.
Seperate from the other books in the series, I really like this book. It has good characters and I am looking forward to reading the rest of the Polly O’Keefe series (although this is the last book of that series).
But as a part of the Wrinkle in Time series, it seems disjointed. It doesn’t quite fit. I uses some of the same people, but they seem different.
But I like Polly, and she is the most important character in this book. Polly, and Nace (a retired bishop) keep stumbling back 3000 years prior to the book. They interact with an ancient tribe of people that have interacted and been influenced by two Druids from pre-history England.
The dark secret is that the people believe in human sacrifice. And there has been a drought. And Polly seems to have been sent by Mother Earth. I like the ending. It is not simple and clean, but it is appropriate. I am glad I have more L’Engle books to read.
I listened to this book. It is the same narrator as Many Waters. She is good, but she is not Madeleine L’Engle. It is odd how the characters in L’Engle’s books interact. It is not clean and clear, but rather strained and outside of regular time. But I appreciate the interaction. It makes me want to read more.
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