I'm a time traveler, too

When You Reach Me
by Rebecca Stead

I have wanted to read this book ever since I heard librarian Nancy Pearl talk about it on NPR. She said the magic words: she said it was an homage to Madeleine L'Engle's A Wrinkle in Time, one of my very favorite novels when I was a child a million years ago.

A Wrinkle in Time is also the favorite novel of 12-year-old Miranda, a sixth grader living in Manhattan in 1978. Miranda is rehearsing a story in her head. She needs to tell the story to a somewhat scary unknown person who's been leaving her hidden notes and appears to know the future. The first note says, "I am coming to save your friend's life and my own." It asks Miranda to write a letter relating the story of the events of the novel, and it asks that she deliver the letter by hand.

This is a bizarre and meaningless request when Miranda first reads it. But as the story unfolds, slowly, slowly, everything becomes clear. By the time you get to the end, you will understand everything that Miranda did.

Nancy Pearl and her librarian friends are predicting that When You Reach Me will win the Newberry Medal for "the most distinguished contribution to American literature for children." Let's see... The writing is excellent. The character's breathe life. The plotting is superlative. And one more thing--by the time I reached the end, I was truly moved. I don't know if it was the story's poignancy or if I was just feeling nostalgic or if it was something in between, but for a few hours this 41-year-old was 12 again. And if that's not time travel, I don't know what is.

A visit with old friends

A Wrinkle in Time
by Madeleine L'Engle

A Wrinkle in Time was one of my favorite books as a child. Growing up, I read it and its sequels over and over, but it must be at least 20 years since I last read this oh so formative novel. It was librarian Nancy Pearl mentioning this classic on NPR recently that made me want to rush out and re-read the book--which is exactly what I did.

Re-reading A Wrinkle in Time--more than 30 years after I first read it--I had several surprises. First, a lot of what I remembered was actually from the sequel, A Wind at the Door. I didn't remember this story well at all, but it sort of came back as I read. And second, I didn't love it the way I did when I was a girl. Don't get me wrong, I liked it a lot. But as a child I loved these books. I can still see why, but it's a different experience and I'm reading with different eyes.

The story concerns the Murray family. Mr. and Mrs. Murray are both scientists, but Mr. Murray has had to leave his family because of his work for the government. The family hasn't heard from him in over a year. That is the situation as the novel opens on the proverbial "dark and stormy night." The eldest Murray child, Meg, winds up in the kitchen that night with her mother and Charles Wallace, her youngest brother. They are indulging in a comforting mug of late-night cocoa when an unexpected visitor shows up.

Mrs. Whatsit is the first of a series of bizarre characters with bizarre names. Before she leaves the Murrays' that night, she provides a clue that she just might know where Mr. Murray is. The following day, Meg and Charles Wallace plan to seek out Mrs. Whatsit and demand further information. Along the way, they meet Meg's schoolmate Calvin O'Keefe who seems to be somehow destined to join them. So begins a great, weird, adventure through time and space.

I will always have great affection for L'Engle's novels. Even though this one no longer has quite the same effect on me, I'm sorely tempted to continue re-reading the series and L'Engle's other works. These are some of my oldest friends, and it's been far too long since my last visit.