This article needs additional citations for verification .(September 2015) |
Author | Madeleine L'Engle |
---|---|
Cover artist | unknown (1960 edition) |
Country | United States |
Language | English |
Series | Austin family |
Genre | Young Adult |
Publisher | Vanguard Press, Farrar, Straus & Giroux |
Publication date | 1960, revised 1997 |
Media type | Print (Hardback) |
Pages | 191 pp (first ed.), 216 (1997 ed.) |
ISBN | 0-374-34929-0 (1997 ed.) |
OCLC | 35235132 |
LC Class | PZ7.L5385 Me 1997 |
Preceded by | A Full House: An Austin Family Christmas |
Followed by | The Moon by Night |
Meet the Austins is the title of a 1960 novel by Madeleine L'Engle, the first of her books about the Austin family. It introduces the characters Vicky Austin and her three siblings, and Maggy Hamilton, an orphan.
Vicky Austin's noisy, loving, mostly-happy family is disrupted when the family's honorary uncle dies in a plane crash. His co-pilot was also killed, leaving behind a ten-year-old daughter, Maggy, who has no one to care for her. The Austins take Maggy in, and she proves to be a spoiled, troubled only child who had very little family life. Maggy encourages Vicky's sister Suzy to misbehave, which makes everyone's life more difficult. Meet the Austins is largely episodic; each chapter covers a specific incident such as Vicky's bicycle accident or a family vacation. Throughout the book, Vicky comments on the changes her family experiences during this time, and the reader sees her growing self-awareness. Although Vicky will later appear in three novels that have fantasy and/or science fiction themes, there are no such elements in Meet the Austins.
Rounding out the family are Vicky's father, Dr. Wallace "Wally" Austin, a doctor in general practice; her mother Victoria Eaton Austin, a retired singer; an uncle, Douglas Austin, a painter who occasionally visits; Aunt Elena, actually a close family friend who is the Austins' connection with the orphaned Maggy; and Grandfather Eaton, a retired minister who lives in a converted stable on fictional Seven Bay Island.
Although Meet the Austins, as the name implies, is the family's first appearance in terms of the publication date, a short, later book, The Twenty-Four Days Before Christmas (1964), takes place five years earlier. Another short Christmas story about the Austins, A Full House: An Austin Family Christmas , takes place about a year before Meet the Austins. A Full House was first published as a short story in two of L'Engle's collections, and then issued as a picture book in 1999. Meet the Austins is followed, in terms of internal chronology as well as publication date, by the full-length novels The Moon by Night (1963), The Young Unicorns (1968), A Ring of Endless Light (1980) and Troubling a Star (1994). Suzy Austin appears as a married adult in A Severed Wasp (1982).
The 1960 first edition of Meet the Austins was published only after many rejections, reportedly because it begins with a death. The original publication left out a chapter about the children's "Anti-Muffin" club, which advocated diversity and portrayed the Austin children as having a close friend who was poor and Hispanic. ("Muffins" are a metaphor for conformity and snobbery.) This missing chapter was published separately in 1980 as The Anti-Muffins. In 1997, the hardcover publisher of L'Engle's novels from 1962 on, Farrar, Straus & Giroux, issued a new edition of Meet the Austins that for the first time incorporated the chapter. Paperback editions prior to 1997 did not include this additional material. However, the next book in the series, The Moon by Night , includes a scene in which Vicky tells Zachary Gray about the Anti-Muffin club, in very nearly the same text that introduces it in the originally-omitted chapter. The 1997 Square Fish paperback edition includes "The Anti-Muffins" as Chapter Five of the book. [2]
Madeleine L'Engle was an American writer of fiction, non-fiction, poetry, and young adult fiction, including A Wrinkle in Time and its sequels: A Wind in the Door, A Swiftly Tilting Planet, Many Waters, and An Acceptable Time. Her works reflect both her Christian faith and her strong interest in modern science.
A Wrinkle in Time is a young adult science fantasy novel written by American author Madeleine L'Engle. First published in 1962, the book won the Newbery Medal, the Sequoyah Book Award, the Lewis Carroll Shelf Award, and was runner-up for the Hans Christian Andersen Award. The main characters – Meg Murry, Charles Wallace Murry, and Calvin O'Keefe – embark on a journey through space and time, from galaxy to galaxy, as they endeavor to rescue the Murrys' father and fight The Black Thing that has intruded into several worlds.
Farrar, Straus and Giroux (FSG) is an American book publishing company, founded in 1946 by Roger Williams Straus Jr. and John C. Farrar. FSG is known for publishing literary books, and its authors have won numerous awards, including Pulitzer Prizes, National Book Awards, and Nobel Prizes. As of 2016 the publisher is a division of Macmillan, whose parent company is the German publishing conglomerate Holtzbrinck Publishing Group.
A Swiftly Tilting Planet is a science fiction novel by Madeleine L'Engle, the third book in the Time Quintet. It was first published in 1978 with cover art by Diane Dillon.
A Ring of Endless Light is a 1980 novel by Madeleine L'Engle. The book tells of teenager Vicky Austin and her struggle to understand life and significance in the universe as she deals with her dying grandfather, while at the same time finding true romantic love. The title originates from a phrase in the seventeenth-century Welsh poet Henry Vaughan's poem "The World."
The Arm of the Starfish is a young adult novel by Madeleine L'Engle, first published in 1965. It is the first novel featuring Polly O'Keefe and the O'Keefe family, a generation after the events of A Wrinkle in Time (1962). The plot concerning advanced regeneration research puts this novel in the science fiction genre, but it could also be described as a mystery thriller.
Hope Raue Larson is an American illustrator and cartoonist. Her main field is comic books.
A Ring of Endless Light is a 2002 Disney Channel Original Movie based on the Madeleine L'Engle book of the same name filmed on location in Australia, and starring Mischa Barton in the main lead role. In the U.S., it was aired on August 23, 2002.
A House Like a Lotus (ISBN 0-374-33385-8) is a 1984 young adult novel by Madeleine L'Engle. Its protagonist is sixteen-year-old Polly O'Keefe, whose friend and mentor, Maximiliana Horne, has sent her on a trip to Greece and Cyprus. As she travels, Polly must come to terms with a recent traumatic event involving Max. The history of Polly's relationship with Max is told in flashback over the course of the novel. The use of double quotes distinguishes the present, whereas single quotes indicate flashbacks from the past.
Adam Eddington III is a major character in three young adult novels by Madeleine L'Engle. A marine biology student, he is the protagonist of The Arm of the Starfish (1965), and a reluctant romantic love interest for Vicky Austin in A Ring of Endless Light (1980), a romantic relationship that continues in Troubling a Star (1994). He is one of three characters to have major appearances in both L'Engle's O'Keefe family series of books and her Austin family series.
Victoria "Vicky" Austin is one of Madeleine L'Engle's frequently used fictional characters, appearing in eight books and referred to in at least one more. She is the protagonist of the Austin family series of books being the first person narrator of Meet the Austins, The Moon by Night, A Ring of Endless Light, Troubling a Star, and the picture book The Twenty-Four Days Before Christmas. A developing poet and writer, Vicky observes the everyday events in her large family, dates several boys, communicates with dolphins, faces the occasional mortal danger, and reflects on important issues about life and death, faith and family as she gradually comes of age.
The Moon by Night (ISBN 0-374-35049-3) is the title of a young adult novel by Madeleine L'Engle. Published in 1963, it is the second novel about Vicky Austin and her family, taking place between the events of Meet the Austins (1960) and The Young Unicorns (1968), and more or less concurrently with the O'Keefe family novel The Arm of the Starfish. The book marks the first appearance of the character Zachary Gray, who dates first Vicky and then Polly O'Keefe. Although Vicky will later appear in three novels that have fantasy and/or science fiction themes, there are no such elements in The Moon By Night.
The Young Unicorns (1968), ISBN 0-374-38778-8) is the title of a young adult suspense novel by American writer Madeleine L'Engle. It is the third novel about the Austin family, taking place between the events of The Moon by Night (1963) and A Ring of Endless Light (1980). Unlike those two novels and Meet the Austins (1960), it does not center on Vicky Austin specifically, but on a family friend, Josiah "Dave" Davidson.
The Small Rain is a semi-autobiographical novel by Madeleine L'Engle, about the many difficulties in the life of talented pianist Katherine Forrester between the ages of 10 and 19. Published in 1945 by the Vanguard Press, it was the first of L'Engle's long list of books, and was reprinted in 1984. L'Engle began work on it in college, and completed it while an actress in New York.
A Severed Wasp (1982) is a novel by Madeleine L'Engle. It continues the story of a pianist, Katherine Forrester, who was first seen in The Small Rain. Now a widow in her seventies, Katherine Forrester Vigneras returns to New York City in retirement from concert touring in Europe. There she encounters Felix Bodeway, an old friend from her Greenwich Village days, who is now the retired Episcopal Bishop of New York. He asks Katherine to give a benefit concert at the Cathedral of St. John the Divine. It turns out to be an unexpected challenge, full of new friends and mysterious dangers.
Madeleine L'Engle, an American novelist, diarist and poet, produced over twenty novels, beginning with The Small Rain (1945), and continuing into the 1990s with A Live Coal in the Sea (1996). Many of her fictional characters appeared in more than one novel, sometimes in more than one series of novels. Other major characters are the protagonists of a single title. This article provides information about L'Engle's most notable characters.
The Time Quintet is a fantasy/science fiction series of five young adult novels written by Madeleine L'Engle.
Madeleine L'Engle has published more than fifty books, including twenty-three novels, virtually all of them interconnected by recurring characters and locales. In particular, L'Engle's three major series have a consistent geography, including a number of significant fictional locations. These generally fall into two categories:
And Both Were Young is a novel by Madeleine L'Engle originally published in 1949. It tells the story of an American girl at boarding school in Switzerland, not long after World War II, and the relationship she develops with a French boy she meets there, who cannot remember his past due to trauma he suffered in the war.
Alexandra Day is an American children's book author. Alexandra Day is a pseudonym; her real name is Sandra Louise Woodward Darling. She is the author of Good Dog, Carl, which tells the story of a Rottweiler named Carl who looks after a baby named Madeleine. The book was first published in 1985 by Day's own publishing company, Green Tiger Press. Good Dog, Carl has been followed by a whole series of popular Carl books, published by Farrar, Straus and Giroux.