As you might guess from some of my other posts, I am enough of an Internet Old that this was a re-read for me.
I thought it held up beautifully.
There was a lot more Jesus/Christian imagery than I remembered from my earlier reads — I mean, I knew it was there, I just didn’t remember it so prevalent. As a person who has come to the understanding that “the Light” has room for a lot more varieties of Goodness, that was a little jarring.
I’m going to skip the book summary part of the review because I figure most of us already know what the plot of the book is.
The rest of it, though, was as I remembered. The children of Camazotz are creepy AF. Meg is a lot like I was at her age, a part of the reason the book was so important to child-me. To have a heroine be praised not for her virtues but for her faults, to have her be successful because she was stubborn and “willful” and an outsider, to have her be strong because of instead of despite.
To have a “strong female character” who wasn’t out kicking ass and taking names. Meg’s strength is her stubbornness and her willfulness but also her compassion. Also her ability to love. And even that is flawed, and the book makes it clear that even that is heroic. The book shows us repeatedly how being brave isn’t not being afraid, but being afraid and doing it anyway. Because someone has to, and the perfect person for that is a person with flaws, who probably ugly cries with snot and the whole nine yards, who is terrified and who loves.
And also, I could probably write papers on Aunt Beast and the value and power of unconditional love. Aunt Beast loves Meg despite the horrible way Meg treats them. Aunt Beast is willing to sacrifice themself for Meg and her quest, despite not knowing her for very long. Aunt Beast is the parent I think a lot of children needed but — for whatever reason — didn’t get. (Which is not to say Meg’s parents don’t love her unconditionally, because nothing in the text or subtext suggests they don’t, but Aunt Beast is a whole ‘nother, well, animal.)