Originally reviewed here @ AngievilleSo. I am a longtime Madeleine L'Engle devotee. It started back when I was 10 with A Wrinkle in Time and it has stretched out over the years into a lifelong love affair. One of the more treasured and personal ones in my life. And while I love all her worlds, this little series, this family, holds a couple of my most beloved. This is actually the third full-length novel in the series, and it's something of a dark sheep, if you will. It's the departure novel, for lack of a better term, the one in which dark things happen and you question whether or not these young characters whom you love will be able to rebound after the fallout. It surprised me when I first read it, coming as it did after the gentler and more staid introductory installments. But the setting, the language, the new characters all wove their spell around me and I always return to it when I am in the mood for whistling in the dark.The Austins have up and moved to New York City. Dr. Austin is working on a research project which requires his residence in the city, and so the family has uprooted itself and settled in Manhattan, not far from the Cathedral of St. John the Divine. It is there that Vicky, Suzy, and Rob meet a young girl named Emily Gregory. Emily is a piano prodigy studying with the brilliant and temperamental Mr. Theotocopulous (Mr. Theo for short). Emily is generally accompanied by an outsider boy named Dave whose job it seems to be to look out for her and be suspicious of things in general. Vicky is sure there's something in Dave's past he's hiding. But the rag-taggle group quickly become fast friends, and the Austins are willing to let Dave tell them his story when he is good and ready. It isn't until Rob, on one of his many rambles through the neighborhood, makes the acquaintance of a genie that danger strikes. This encounter with the genie (complete with magic lamp) leads the children on a journey through the darker underworld of their new home. A gang called the Alphabats dog their heels, with a particular emphasis on Dave. A strange man by the name of Canon Tallis has taken up residence at the Cathedral and appears intent on following the children as well. Everyone's motives are unclear, and soon events are spiraling out of control as the Austins and Co. race to uncover the thread connecting them all.Just to whet your appetite, here's a favorite scene from the first couple of pages of the book:The man in the fur hat left the shadows of the doorway and followed the oddly assorted trio: the dark, shabby boy; the definitely younger and rather elegant girl; and the fair little boy who couldn't have been more than seven or eight years old.They reached the corner and turned down Broadway. The bitter wind whipped a few brown leaves and bits of soiled newspaper across the sidewalk. Strands of Emily's fine, dark hair blew across her face and she pushed it back impatiently. As they passed a shabby little antique shop with a gloomy bit of oddments on the sidewalk in front of the dusty windows, Dave paused."It was here," Rob said. "Right here."Emily pulled impatiently at Dave's arm, but the older boy stood, looking at the shop window, at the door with the sign PHOOKA'S ANTIQUES, then moved on, more slowly.Shortly before they reached 110th Street the man with the fur hat pulled ahead of them and merged with a group of people clustered about a newsstand. He held a paper so that he could look past it at the children as they came by.The little boy, who had made friends with the crippled man who owned the newsstand, looked up to wave hello. His mouth opened in startled recognition as his eyes met those of their follower. He didn't hear the news vendor call out, "Hi, Robby, what's up?"The man in the fur hat smiled at the small boy, nodded briefly, rolled up his newspaper, and turned back in the direction of the Cathedral.Dave and Emily had gone on ahead. Rob ran after them, calling, "Dave! He's the one!" He tugged at the older boy's sleeve."Who's what one?" Dave pulled impatiently away from the scarlet mitten."The man we saw yesterday, the one who talked to Emily!"Dave stopped. "Where?"Rob pointed towards the Cathedral."Wait!" Dave ran back around the corner."Emily, he was the one," Rob said. "I'm sorry, but I know he was.""I don't want to talk about it." Emily's face looked pale and old beyond her years. She was just moving into adolescence, but her expression had nothing childlike about it. "It couldn't have been the same one," she whispered."But it was real," Rob persisted. "It did happen."Dave returned. "I didn't see anybody. Anyway, how do you know he was the one?""Because he had no eyebrows."Emily gave a shudder that had nothing to do with the cold.What an opener. This book reminds me in many ways of Philip Pullman's Sally Lockhart series. Mysterious. Dark. A sense of impending doom drooping over the whole thing. I eat this stuff up with a spoon. I love THE YOUNG UNICORNS because it branches out so ambitiously. Dave, Emily, and Mr. Theo burst onto the scene and into the reader's heart without even a by your leave, and the Austins almost take a back seat to their new friends, their new neighborhood, their new life. I love L'Engle's New York City. I love the way she just plops her quiet family down in the middle of a boiling and boisterous city and allows them to explore and be worked upon and changed by its life and color and variety. The cathedral itself is essentially a character in its own right, serving as the perfect backdrop for the secret plots and underhanded machinations that take place within the pages of this story. Ms. L'Engle was writer-in-residence at this very cathedral for many years, and her knowledge of (and love for) its halls and corners and denizens is evident here. To say nothing of the crossover characters with which she graces the tale. Canon Tallis is a particular favorite and one I am always relieved to see show up, both for his keen intelligence and his checkered background. I knew the children would be safer with him at their backs. But things do get decidedly bleak (and a fair bit deranged) before they get better. But if a love of mystery lurks anywhere in your heart, you do not want to pass this one up. L'Engle's lovely words wrap around these precocious children and see them through to the very end. I think I've been in love with Dave ever since I first read this book, and it is his journey that is the most compelling to me. A true standout in the middle of an excellent series.
The key to a good epigraph is finding something that sparks interest in the reader at the beginning but knocks him flat with its emotional voltage if he happens to re-read it afterward. L'Engle proved her epigraph-choosing mettle with the use of a sentence and a half referencing the untameability of the unicorn. It's a perfect fit for the story.At least, it is to the reader like me who fires up with love for the young protagonist. Josiah—no, boy, I'm not just calling you Dave, not when there's so much beauty and dignity in your real name—is the sort to stir motherly impulses as well as sympathetic ones: a surly young introvert, too bitter to ask for help escaping the long-reaching tentacles of a dangerous past, but possessing a gentle heart and a nascent trustworthiness under the resentment and off-putting coldness. The story is of the crux moment of his life, the balance point where he either surrenders backward into the quicksand or accepts the outstretched hand above him and pulls free.The third person omniscient narrative doesn't separate him from the reader, and I spent the book wanting to plead with him and fight for him and hug him by turns. None of which he'd have been likely to appreciate, but it's the reader's prerogative to feel.L'Engle's naming choices often carry some symbolic value, and the connection of Josiah Davidson to the Davidic king of Israel is openly remarked on in the book and reinforced by his father's name. Nor is it the only name of interest, as exemplified by Canon Tallis—the surname references the Jewish prayer shawl—and Mr. Theotocopoulos, the latter of which suggests the Theotokos (the ancient Marian name 'God-bearer', usually brought into English as "mother of God"). Whether the common names are hand-picked for meaning is less clear, but there are some curious parallels—notably Emily Gregory, whose name loosely means "watchful rival"; she's the blinded but perceptive angel against the darkness in Josiah/Dave's past. And even the nickname Dave comes from the Hebrew for beloved.As with most of L'Engle's work, the characters carry the book—which is really why I love her. There's so much back story to the main few that I felt like I'd missed a previous installment. Which, in the Austins' case, I suppose I had, but that feeling came more from Emily and Dave than the others. It's an interesting example of kicking off narrative in the middle of a story, anyway.The novel attempts to work on several fronts and succeeds better on some than on others. As futuristic tale, it feels rather outdated; lasers were new technology in the sixties when the book was written, but now they're commonly used in surgeries without having gained any notable popularity as an alternative means of getting high. As mystery, the book is startlingly successful; all the clues were present, yet the plot twist still came as a stunner. As character study of an innocent family's brush with deadly evil, it's light but beautiful. As old-school young adult novel, it's saved from being annoyingly preachy only by its moments of unique wisdom. And as a story of redemption, it's sweet and, in its own simple way, astounding.L'Engle's novels, while nearly always likable, are often a little uneven, especially when submitted to the test of time. This book isn't perfect, but the story caught me very personally and got into my affections. Where that wasn't owing to Josiah Davidson or Emily or the bright-eyed, bright-hearted little Rob, whom I also loved, it was owing to music.Music got to play its own role in the book, and L'Engle knows her stuff. She makes numerous thoughtful references to great composers and works, such as the moment where Dave picks up his English horn and plays the solo from the prelude to the third act of Tristan and Isolde. And her scenes of Mr. Theo playing the cathedral organ are almost enough to make the reader feel the blast of sound coming from the pipes. The skill behind the art is also treated attentively; Emily's blindness combines with her musical prowess to give her an exceptional ability to listen as well as a powerful kinesthetic sense and memory. For such a short book, it's all spectacularly done.The ending, if I'm being honest, is a little too much in the lessons-learned order. The groundwork is present, so the resolution itself is believable, but some of the dialogue toward the end is not, really. The final scene or two could certainly have been better handled.That little flaw bothered me a bit, but love covers over a multitude of wrongs. I loved the story and the characters far too much to fail to forgive.
What do You think about The Young Unicorns (1989)?
My L'Engle reviews seem to have a theme: complaining noises followed by assertions why said complaints are meaningless in view of the whole, and a reference to love as the universal solvent. This book is no different. I'm unable to keep from rolling my eyes when Rob, age 7, pipes up with a malapropism followed with an erudite comment on the second movement of some obscure 12th century piece of music which he knows by heart. The plot here is so unrealistic it would be laughable in anyone else's hands. The scary laser? The tough, gun-toting 'hoods' with the third-grade name? The hysteria about what L'Engle insisted on calling "pot" and "acid" to further distance herself from them? The villains are one-dimensional. Wait for it... Yeah, not a bit of this matters. Honest. Just doesn't matter. The preachifying, the transparent manipulation? Just doesn't matter. Somehow, L'Engle transcends all of that, sucks you in, makes you believe, and holds your hand throughout. Her unvarying theme- love, love, love- makes the Austins real, makes Canon Tallis true, makes the Rabbi lovable, makes your heart pound at all the right places. It's a wonderful book. Put that in the pocket of your scorflam jacket and take it to the bank.
—Melody
I had forgotten how satisfying L'Engle's novels can be. Her adult characters are wise, kind, and attentive to children. There's a battle between good and evil. There's a mystery and a big family, with multiple hangers on who are welcomed and loved. Science forms some of the plot line--and L'Engle was prescient. Adults befriend children, cherish them, speak to them seriously, but not all adults are like this. Some are evil and wish to use children to their own ends. Rather than find this frightening, as a child I found it comforting, because it confirmed my own conclusions of the nature of human character.In this novel, Mrs. Austin is the least developed character. She is a mother and homemaker, but does not drive any of the action. The younger female characters, Emily and Vickie, express L'Engle's vision of the possibility of more fully realized female roles in the next generation (that would have been baby-boomers to her). There's a touch of nostalgia I feel when I read her books--for one, where in Manhattan are there shabby three story mansions for middle class families with just one income? Those days are gone. Also, though Emily is consumed by her music, the other children have enough free time to explore neighborhoods and visit neighbors. This is an out-dated vision of childhood, unfortunately. L'Engle's discussion of morality, ethics, and spirituality, always seems smart and appealing to me. I'm glad I found this on the shelf of my public library.
—Peggy
Although I'm not a big reader of fantasy, I absolutely love Madeleine L'Engle's books. It doesn't matter if you are a grown-up, and this book is billed as young adult; read it anyway!L'Engle explores the topic of a powerful gang in New York City (not your typical shoot-out gang, but more psychological and sinister), which meets in an abandoned subway station. The leader has come into the possession of a powerful laser, which he uses to control his subjects. He obtained the laser by breaking into the apartment of the scientist who developed it, blinding the scientist's musically talented daughter, Emily, in the process.The gang is working to control New York City, and travels through a series of subway tunnels. The workings of the Alphabats (as they call themselves) intersect with the lives of Emily and the Austin family (from another L'Engle series), who are on a year's sabbatical in New York.I don't have the words to describe how gripping this book is. The point of the novel is not to terrify the reader, but to explore issues of morality, and to a lesser extent, religion, and how good can triumph over evil.
—Megan
