A Severed Wasp (1982)

This book is concerned with the unreasonableness of love, and how love transforms. The characters are deep, complex and self-aware, for the most part. One complaint I have is that L'Engle has some gay characters in this book, but it's clear that she just doesn't *get* it.

This is a sequel to one of her earliest novels, [b:The Small Rain|251947|The Small Rain (Vigneras, #1)|Madeleine L'Engle|http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1173150818s/251947.jpg|449236], and reading them one after the other brings a few things about L'Engle into sharp focus. The foremost is how much she grew as a writer in the years between these books. It's also clear that she stayed true to her central message, that love in all its facets is the engine which powers the universe. It's a message I embrace.

There's a scary undercurrent to this novel, set in a grim and nearly lawless New York. It's a morally complex, challenging novel, and I enjoyed it mightily. ( )

The sequel to A Small Rain. It was fascinating to see the years that had gone by in terms of L’Engle’s writing and approach to life and religion and all sorts of things. I don’t think either book will ever rank in my favorites, but I did like it, especially for the wrapping-up of a couple of stories from the Austin books. ( )

The book was slow to get me interested, but by the end I could not put it down. The characters were well developed that I felt comfortable with them and did not want to see them go. (Even if I didn't like a bunch of them!) I would recommend this book. ( )

I thought my adult life would be more like this. ( )

I love Madeline L'engles writing. I love her characters and I am at home in her books. It is a pleasure to read them. I was disappointed with the end of the book and with some of the details of the story. Character is always more important to me than story though so despite my disappointment, I was mostly happy. ( )