This slim, conversational memoir articulated a lot of my swirling ideas about art and creativity. L'engle combines insights from her own journey with masterful storytelling to make her case for art as something necessary and vital, for Christians, for everyone. This book makes me want to do the work, and that's saying something. Read (and re-read) it slowly.

L’Engle begins her groundbreaking science fiction/fantasy work with the famous opening line “It was a dark and stormy night,” and plunges you headlong into the world of the Murray family, who must travel through time to save the universe. I wanted to be Meg, of course. Wrinkle is the first—and most famous—of the Time Quintet, but I read them all, again and again.

L’Engle begins her groundbreaking science fiction-fantasy series with the famous opening line “It was a dark and stormy night,” and plunges you headlong into the world of the Murry family, who must travel through time to save the universe. The novels are interwoven, but each stands on its own.

I’ve adopted Madeleine L’Engle as an honorary mentor. Anyone who can coin a phrase like “the tired thirties” and admit that her kids told her to sit down at the typewriter and write when she got cranky is worth listening to. I suspect our brains work the same way (except for the part where hers cranks out gorgeous fiction and mine is terrified of the genre).

This is the second book of L'Engle's Crosswicks Journals. I love the first installment, A Circle of Quiet, so much that I read it three times this year. But every time I turn my eyes towards volume 2 my pace slows to a crawl and I stall out around page 30. Maybe one day I'll summon the resolve to make it through. In the meantime, I'm enjoying Listening for Madeleine: A Portrait of Madeleine L'Engle in Many Voices.

Madeleine L'Engle is best known for her A Wrinkle in Time quintet, but the Austin family is just as welcoming, consisting of four kids, a newly orphaned girl, two dogs, several cats, a steady stream of friends dropping in, and intelligent family dinner-table talk that veers into the ethics of meat eating, the solar system, and Einstein.

I love the first installment, A Circle of Quiet, so much that I read it three times. I've adopted Madeleine L’Engle as an honorary mentor. Anyone who can coin a phrase like "the tired thirties" and admit that her kids told her to sit down at the typewriter and write when she got cranky is worth listening to. I suspect our brains work the same way (except for the part where hers cranks out gorgeous fiction and mine is terrified of the genre).

From the publisher: "Celebrate the season with this beautiful and inspiring collection of thoughtful reflections on Christmas from the bestselling author of A Wrinkle in Time. For more than seventy years, Madeleine L’Engle’s writing have delighted and inspired readers. In her stories, essays, poems, journal entries, and letters, she returned again and again to the beauty of Christmas, illuminating the holiday with her singular insight and imagination. Miracle on 10th Street includes excerpts from her most cherished works, reflecting on Advent, Incarnation, Epiphany, mystery, and redemption. In these pages, L’Engle points to the marvels and curiosities that fill everyday life. And, as always, she shows herself to be a one-woman force for celebration—fully believing that delight and wonder must mark the life of anyone who sees God’s love at work."