A RING OF ENDLESS LIGHT

In the fourth book in Madeleine L’Engle’s Austin family series, we’re back in Vicky’s first-person narration (after a third-person detour for The Young Unicorns) and the clan is heading back to their former life in small-town New England after that adventurous year in NYC. But first, they’re spending the summer at the island home of Grandfather Eaton, who’s dying of leukemia. As if trying to come to terms with her grandfather’s illness weren’t enough, Vicky is also mourning the death of Commander Rodney, a family friend, and dealing with the reappearance of Zachary Grey, the bad-boy-with-a-death-wish from The Moon by Night whose suicide attempt was the cause of it (the Commander had a heart attack after rescuing Zachary from drowning). And she’s not only getting romantic attention from Zachary, but also from Leo, Commander Rodney’s solid-but-boring son (awkward!), and maybe from Adam Eddington of The Arm of the Starfish, a colleague of Vicky’s brother John who wants her to help him with his marine biology research. Which leads to the little matter of Vicky’s discovery that SHE CAN COMMUNICATE TELEPATHICALLY WITH DOLPHINS.

I know I read A Ring of Endless Light once as a child, because who could forget OMG DOLPHINS. But I remember being a bit befuddled by it, and with good reason. This is a superb book, all casual-beachy-relaxing on one hand—morning swims, hamburger cookouts in the cove (I was always intrigued by islands as a child and still have a real soft spot for summer-vacation-at-the-seaside stories, although Over Sea, Under Stone is the only example I can think of off the top of my head)—and serious metaphysics on the other, but it’s even stronger within the context of the other books. Vicky has been gradually coming of age since the series began, but in this book she’s grappling with the Big Two, sex and death. Death in particular looms large, not only in Grandfather’s heartbreaking deterioration, but Leo’s loss of his father, Zachary’s loss of his mother, Adam’s mourning for Joshua (from Starfish—so glad I detoured to read that book before I got to this one), the demise of a baby dolphin, and even the death of a sick little girl in Vicky’s arms. The sex is purely theoretical (although Vicky does at least acknowledge that it could happen if she wanted it to, which surprised me at first until I realized this was published a full 20 years after the very wholesome Meet the Austins), but it remains a constant undercurrent as Vicky tries to untangle her feelings for the three very different men she encounters. I like, though, that the story isn’t a conventional teen romance where the central question is “Which boy will she choose?” Vicky is a fully realized character with bigger fish to fry (those newly discovered pyschic powers, for one), and the guys don’t represent a potential happy ending, just three very different possible responses to death and approaches to life. Although there’s no good-versus-evil battle here, this is hands down the deepest YA book I’ve ever read: It is literally about a girl trying to figure out the meaning of life. With a little help from some dolphins.