I have a great problem with this book. But as it has next to nothing to do with the plot and the events, I’ll leave it for the end of this review.

When the story begins, we get to learn that a crazy South American dictator (this was written in 1979, so dictators were a common thing around this place) is threatening the US with a nuclear missile (don’t think too much about this). So Charles Wallace’s mission is to travel back in time and discover how to solve this whole mess. He’s called to this by Meg’s mother-in-law, Mrs. O’Keefe (I TOTALLY KNEW IT!!!), who recites a magical rune that has been in her family for centuries.

When I say “time travel” I don’t mean like, two month before, I mean centuries ago. Charles Wallace travels to medieval Wales and North America to follow a magician/prince who fled from Wales to America to escape his evil brother. The brother finds him and they have an epic confrontation, after which the evil brother flees to South America. Then he travels to Puritan-time NA, and 19th century New England and Patagonia, all in order to solve the whole mess and change Branzillo’s ascendency.

Charles is sent within different people in these different times and has to influence the events in their times. And these events always involve one descendant from the good Welsh prince, and a descendant from the evil one. The ultimate goal is to make Branzillo a descendent of the former, rather than of the latter.

As the previous novels in this series, one of the main topics is how people can influence the whole world. And even before Charles Wallace begins his journey, we have Mrs. O’Keefe acting on her own to defend the world. It’s a very powerful moment, because all that we’ve learnt from Calvin previously is that she sucks as a mother. In this book we learn why, and it’s heartbreaking.

The thing I didn’t like about this book was how Meg acted. In previous books, she’s always the heroine (she kicks ass), but now she’s married (to Calvin, of course) and heavily pregnant. Of course, that forbids her from joining her brother in this adventure, and she can only participate in it by kything, their telepathic-like form of communication. I know that it’s because of her pregnancy, but I wished she had been more active, instead of changing to a nurturing mother-figure.

Still… Calvin and Meg are a thing. My fangirl heart exploded and died.

Overall, a good book, though it doesn’t get quite to the same level of the other books. It’s still a nice read and very entertaining. And there’s the point of the Welsh settlement in Patagonia that was pretty cool. I’m not sure about if there were settlements like that in there, but I do know that some Welsh (and Welsh-descendant) explorers did explore this area. My mother’s family comes from Wales and a lot of her ancestors travelled through the south in the 19th century.

So, here’s my big, huge, enormous, great complaint about this book.

There’s a moment in which the characters mention that Patagonia is warmer than New England, where the Murrys live.

I know that this book is supposed to be fantastic, and the fact that there’s no country between Chile and Argentina also points to different geography. But the Patagonia I know is closer to the South Pole than to the Equator. So, unless we get upside-down geography (and Brazil gets to be closer to the Antartica), I don't see how this'd work.

I’m really sorry to blow up the bubble of you, Northern Hemisphere People: there’s more in Latin America than just beaches and bananas. There’s actually a lot of variety regarding climates, vegetations and cultures. This is what Patagonia looks like in reality.



Totally the place for a daiquiri and beach volleyball, isn’t it?

I grew up in a place that’s not really that far away from the Chilean Patagonia (a little to the North, actually, but the touristic merchandising usually adds the word “Patagonia” to our town’s name). You can imagine that reading that it was “warmer” than New England made me suspend my suspension of disbelief for a moment. My town is usually very cold, we get long winters and lots of rain. Imagine how it's further South.

I’m addressing this here, because it’s not the first time it has happened. There was a movie with Hilary Swanks some years ago that began with the caption: “Concepción, Chile”. And the city showed had coconut trees and people wearing colorful hawaian shirts (the police, for some strange reason wore blue instead of green, as well). And it was incredibly sunny!

This is how Concepción actually looks like:



When you see the coconuts, please let me know.

My complaint here is directed to how people in other countries do not even bother to investigate a little about other places, especially if you’re writing about them. Instead of assuming that all South American countries look like Colombia or Brazil (or assuming that those countries look as their fictional versions), try to get information. It’s not that hard, actually.

And what L’Engle does here is what in my major is called “othering”. She’s not bothering with us, but she adds this country and invents a climate that does not exist for the sole reason that is sound exotic. And the fact that this is here, in a series that repeatedly says that everyone is important and matters to the world is just odd.

I won’t say anything about the plot of the South American dictator, because when this was written (1979), it was kind of the truth. I wonder how Branzillo, Videla and Pinochet got on, actually.