I read Madeleine L’Engle’s classic, Newbery-award-winning book A Wrinkle in Time (Madeleine L’Engle’s Time Quintet) for the first time only because it was the assigned book for bookclub.

Unlike my husband, I wasn’t assigned to read it in school. Despite being a voracious reader growing up. Despite loving the fantasy genre, I never voluntarily read it as an adult.

I’m not entirely sure how I feel about it. I liked the character of Meg quite a bit. I liked her younger brother Charles Wallace well enough. I didn’t feel like I got to know Calvin that well, but he was an interesting character. However, nothing about the book got me super excited to find out more about the characters, and what happened to them in later books in the series.

I felt like there were too many occasions where instead of really explaining something, L’Engle instead had one of the “wiser” characters express frustration that the concepts just couldn’t really be explained in words. Jumbled bits of half-explanations were almost given, with the caveat that “There’s some things we just aren’t meant to understand.” It’s okay though, Charles Wallace has such a prodigious intellect that he understands and tells Meg that it’s allright. (yes, that’s sarcasm.)

Some of my frustrations with the book may just be because it was so groundbreaking, things I like and take for granted now were something rare and special, like having a girl be the main character and hero in a science fiction/fantasy novel. Maybe it only seemed so formulaic to me because it set the formula that many other books have followed?

L’Engle includes one of my most-loathed contrivances in children’s literature, the wise adult dismissing children with the equivalent of “you aren’t old enough/mature enough to understand, but meanwhile go off and save the world because you’re the only one(s) who can. You just won’t know what you’re facing.” But of course the wise adults have super-powers and can magically appear just when they’re most needed and/or provide some sort of prop with special qualities that can save the heroes.

There are so many times when I read books that are wildly praised and wonder what’s all the fuss, and this is definitely one of those times. The book was ok, but in no way is it even close to being one of my favorite books of all time, and I know of many people for whom that is the case.

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Getting the most out of your 168 hours takes discipline in a distracted world.

When you focus on what you do best, on what brings you the most satisfaction, there is plenty of space for everything.

In Laura Vanderkam‘s book 168 Hours: You Have More Time Than You Think, her premise is basically the same as in her book All The Money in the World – that everything is about choices and priorities. When we say “yes” to one thing, it means we say “no” to something else. Whether that yes is to spending money on one thing versus another, or using time for one thing instead of another.

Vanderkam does an excellent job of emphasizing prioritizing what you do with your time, so that you are choosing to use your 168 hours every week in a way that gets you closer to your goals and priorities. The book is really less about time-management than prioritizing and discipline. That’s something that everyone can benefit from I believe.

I especially appreciated the section on developing a list of 100 Dreams, and seeing what you could do to make progress towards those dreams. I also thought her suggestion on developing a list of tasks you can do in 30 minutes or less, and a list of ones that you can do in 10 minutes or less was brilliant. I very rarely have any large blocks of time to accomplish things, but I can find 5 – 15 minutes semi-regularly throughout the day.

What else did I like?

I liked that it got me thinking about how I spend my time and how I could better spend it to align with my priorities and goals, instead of frittering it away on insignificant things.

I liked the reminder to think about my time over the course of a week instead of only one day at a time.

I liked the encouragement to re-frame my thinking to “it’s not a priority,” instead of “I don’t have time.”

I liked the examples she gave of people who are accomplishing a lot by really thinking about how they use their time.

I liked the concept of the 100 Dreams List, and the encouragement to take action towards items on that list.

I liked her focus on core competencies (although I would argue with her over her feelings about child care on that list).

I did have one big complaint about the book, and that was that I think she really trivialized the value of being a stay-at-home parent. She seems to relish repeating statistics that stay-at-home moms spend insignificant amounts of extra time on meaningful interactions with their children when compared to full-time working moms.

Her opinion is apparently that mothers should of course work full time (part-time work being no real work-life balance; it allows too little time for work and too much for life). “Quality time” with children for a few hours in the evening and longer hours on weekends provides ample opportunity to nurture those bonds, and daycare or a nanny can easily handle routine care tasks that aren’t a core competency.

Yes, I’m a stay-at-home mom, and yes, I was disappointed in her implication that so much of what I do is meaningless and should be outsourced so that I could focus on my Career (please note the capital-C Career). She explicitly states in the final chapter that the key message of the book is that there is time for anything that matters. I guess I do agree with this premise, I just disagree with her on some of what matters. However, this complaint does not take away from the value I did find in the book.

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