Time in a Box

So, maybe you've picked up the idea that I love books. Perhaps that I love C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien as well. But maybe it wasn't so obvious that I like Madeleine L'Engle.
For several years, I heard about her books, but just never made the time to read them. They stayed at the top of my To Read When Time Makes Itself Available list. Funny, considering how the book of hers that I planned to read was named A Wrinkle in Time. Hey, it was an interesting enough title and I was kept wondering for years about what in earth and space a wrinkle in time was.
About a year and a half ago, I finally picked up that aforementioned book because my grandmother kindly bought it for me. (Thank you!) And I devoured it in a few moments time, or so it seemed. Probably was more like two hours or so. Then, going through some boxes of books which were picked up for nickel apiece at some long-forgotten library sale, I found a book which I remembered having an exchange sister read. The cover was torn and the whole book was in pretty sad shape. Opening it to the beginning, I realised that it was indeed the sequel to The Wrinkle, A Wind in the Door. I read it pretty fast, and loved it. Now fully in love with L'Engle's writing, the next time we went to Anchorage, I found myself a copy of the third book, A Swiftly Tilting Planet and read it. However, from there on, I could never find any copies of either Many Waters or An Acceptable Time. I was very disappointed. Andro promised to bring them for me when we visit colleges together in a few weeks, so I was finally mollified.
My brother going to college actually made me think even more about the series. They were the only things I'd ever read that made me interested in science or math. Especially physics. I'm not sure why, but the whole idea of time being wrinkled, of folding time and the limits of things - it was very intriguing. Whilst talking to various friends of his, every time we would get on a science related subject, I'd remember something from the books that would bail me out from the confusion that all their terms induced. But again and again, I found that none of them had ever read L'Engle. (After all, they're in college for maths not for English.) So I found myself constantly suggesting that they read her books. And consequently, I began talking about them a lot more.
Yesterday, Dad went up to Anchorage and stopped by the bookstore up there. As I was going to RCO rehearsal, my phone started ringing. Dad started asking which L'Engle books I was missing. Well- they had singles of books 1,2,3, and 5, but he couldn't find 4... except in the box set of all of them. Would I like to have him pick up the box set.
That was a yes. So, late last night when Dad came home, he handed me off the box. I was happy, to say the least. At long last, I had my little mitts on the whole Time Quintet!
This morning, I was about to dive into book four, when I realized I hadn't read the first three in a few months... and I was a bit rusty. The most obvious thing to do was to read the whole series. A Wrinkle disappeared very quickly, and the second, A Wind in the Door, went a little slower, due to my computer being up and doing things around the house. But now, I'm fully prepared to start in on A Swiftly Tilting Planet and we'll see how fast I get through the other books.
For the time being, I'm estatic with my newly-accquired Time in a Box.