A Ring of Endless Light facts for kids
A Ring of Endless Light, first edition
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| Author | Madeleine L'Engle |
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| Cover artist | Fred Marcellino (hardback) |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Series | Austin family |
| Subject | love, death, growing up |
| Genre | Young Adult |
| Publisher | Farrar, Straus & Giroux |
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Publication date
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1980 |
| Media type | Print (hardback) |
| Pages | 324 pp |
| ISBN | 0-374-36299-8 |
| OCLC | 5894387 |
| LC Class | PZ7.L5385 Ri 1980 |
| Preceded by | The Young Unicorns |
| Followed by | Troubling a Star |
A Ring of Endless Light is a 1980 novel by Madeleine L'Engle. The book tells of teenager Vicky Austin and her struggle to understand life and significance in the universe as she deals with her dying grandfather, while at the same time finding true romantic love. The title originates from a phrase in the seventeenth-century Welsh poet Henry Vaughan's poem "The World."
Awards and honors
A Ring of Endless Light was named Newbery Honor Book in 1981. It also won the Dorothy Canfield Fisher Children's Book Award, the California Young Reader Medal (1982) and the Colorado Children's Book Award (1983).
TV movie
In 2002, the Disney Channel made A Ring of Endless Light into a made-for-TV movie starring Mischa Barton and Ryan Merriman. The film's plot veered substantially from that of the book. Vicky's parents are conveniently absent for much of the movie. Vicky's astronomy-minded elder brother John is not mentioned, and Suzy is interested in astronomy instead of medicine. Grandfather Eaton's illness is undisclosed at first, instead of being the reason the family is spending the summer with him. Other examples of death and dying are absent entirely from the movie, along with such characters as Leo Rodney and his family, and the dying child Binnie. Whole-cloth additions to the story include Adam and Zachary teaming up to save dolphins from illegal drift nets, and Vicky being under pressure to study science in order to gain admission to an elite school.
