Many Waters by Madeleine L'Engle
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I’m probably about to start “a thing” but I think Many Waters might be better than A Wrinkle In Time and is definitely a stronger book than either A Wind in the Door or A Swiftly Tilting Planet. Don’t get me wrong, I am very fond of A Wrinkle In Time but L’Engle’s tendency to mesh theoretical physics, fantasy, and Christian allegory yields inconsistent results. In the case of Many Waters, the theoretical physics gets shoved into the periphery leaving the narrative to focus on the allegory and the fantasy.

Many Waters focus on the twins: Sandy and Denny. They accidentally mess with one of their father’s experiments and get zapped back in time. They find themselves caught up in the story of Noah and the flood. L’Engle’s retelling of this bible story adds many elements and explores a variety of interesting themes. My favorites involve the potential conflict between love and pleasure, the paucity of information on the women in the story, and the idea of faith in a world where seraphim and nephilim walk around and interact with humans. Strangely, this is one of her more overtly religious books, yet it’s definitely one of my favorites - which is odd for me.


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