The Moment of Tenderness, a short story collection by Madeleine L’Engle, is a timely dose of human connection for fans of A Wrinkle in Time.
I’ve always been in awe of Madeleine L’Engle’s ability to combine science fiction with powerful spiritual and emotional drama, creating something beautifully approachable.
Like many others, I’m mostly familiar with her A Wrinkle in Time book series, which follows the adventures of the Murry family and is a powerful combination of L’Engle’s prowess in science fiction and human drama — as well as the values she drew from her Christian faith.
Because of that, I was curious to see the writing that surrounded her published novels, and I’m happy to say that by reading The Moment of Tenderness, a collection of her short stories, I now feel like I understand a lot more about L’Engle’s own life, beliefs, and career.
The collection was compiled by L’Engle’s granddaughter, Charlotte Jones Voiklis, and her introduction is just as worth reading as the stories themselves!
Many of the same elements that made L’Engle’s novels famous are present in these 18 short stories, written mostly in the 1940s and 1950s and compiled many years after her passing in 2007. They explore many different topics, characters and genres, but they’re all distinctly L’Engle’s, although written at different moments in her life.
The book is organized in a loosely chronological order, and it’s interesting to see how the protagonists also get older as you go along. Fans of L’Engle’s Camilla, Two-Part Invention and A Circle of Quiet might find some stories familiar, as she later incorporated some of their elements into her novels.
Fans of A Wrinkle in Time will get less space travel and more family dynamics, but there’s quite a bit that’s reminiscent of Meg’s experiences at school, probably drawing on L’Engle’s own bad memories of her childhood, exploring the difficult social dynamics at play among young girls.
Here and there, there’s also a little romance, and a lot of coming-of-age. And later on, there’s a lot about neighborhoods and suburban family life… particularly in insular, conservative communities, which creates some excellent characters.
However, there still is space travel and aliens — and maybe a witch or two thrown in!
Among my favorite stories in this book were “Prelude to the First Night Alone,” an amazingly written snapshot at the resentment and grief that comes with an unjust breakup.
“Julio at the Party” feels particularly relevant nowadays, even though it was written decades ago, as it follows a rich hostess trying to keep the peace at a drunken party between two people with very stark political differences.
And “The Moment of Tenderness” is a unique take on romantic connection between two married people that isn’t quite adultery… or is it?
“Poor Little Saturday” and “A Sign for a Sparrow” are the last two of the collection, and are perhaps more fantasy-like, more reminiscent of the type of writing L’Engle used for A Wrinkle in Time. “A Sign for a Sparrow” does read differently in 2020 than it probably did when it was written, though.
“The Foreigners” was the one that really stayed with me. It tells the tale of a small conservative community when an obnoxious new family moves in, and how it alters the normal rhythm of the neighborhood — but maybe not as much as they think. The main character seems to appear in “The Fact of the Matter,” too, which almost makes me wish there could be a mini-series about her.
The stories deal with the lives of very different people, but they always feel distinctly real. Whether it’s a schoolteacher, an artist or a housewife, The Moment of Tenderness immerses you in the realities of many different lives, with their sorrows and pains, pleasures and joys.
It also brings you stories from different regions of the United States — mostly places where L’Engle herself once lived — with insight into the culture and people that live in each one, as well as the little things like the sketchy motel rooms, the plants in overgrown plantations, and the perfectly-mowed lawns of suburban America.
L’Engle has the uncanny ability to distill exactly how situations feel and how they make a person act: the eerie moment as a child when you realize that you are growing into another person entirely, to the infatuation brought on by brief contact with a soulmate, to the horror of seeing the contrast between your childhood memories and your aging parents.
She makes you feel all these feelings — again, or for the first time — through the actions of her protagonists, as they lash out or hesitate, hold someone’s gaze or look away, scream or stay silent.
The Moment of Tenderness makes for excellent book to immerse yourself in when you’re at home, confined by social distancing, but you might find yourself going back to it again once the crisis is over. I know that it has given me plenty of memorable scenes that I’ll want to re-read again and again.
The Moment of Tenderness is available for order on Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and your local independent bookstore. Also, don’t forget to add it to your Goodreads “to read” list!
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