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68th out of 99 books
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25 voters
Dragons in the Water (O'Keefe Family #2)
Ingram A thirteen-year-old boy's trip to Venezuela with his cousin culminates in murder and the discovery of an unexpected bond with an Indian tribe, dating from the days of Simon Bolivar.
A stolen heirloom painting…a shipboardmurder…Can Simon and the O'Keefe clan unravel themystery?
Thirteen-year-old Simon Renierhas no idea when he boards the M.S. Orion with hiscousin Forsy
Mass Market Paperback, 330 pages
Published
August 1982
by Laurel-Leaf Books
(first published 1976)
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I started checking out Madeleine L'Engle's books out of the library for Alex, and I realized that I really couldn't tell him anything about some of them. This was one, so I decided to re-read it; I think the reason I didn't remember it is that it’s really not one of her better ones. Some of her characters are here: some of the O’Keefes, and Mr. Theo, and Canon Tallis makes an appearance at the end. But the story is mainly about 13-year-old Simon Renier, who has been living in genteel poverty wit...more
Dragons in the Waters doesn't stand out for me quite as much as it should. It's quite different from the others in the chronos and kairos sequences, being a murder mystery and starring Simon Renier, who in many ways lives in the past. Mr. Theo, Canon Tallis, and the O'Keefes make appearances, with Poly and Charles O'Keefe playing the largest roles beside Simon.
Mystery isn't really L'Engle's forte; she's not very good at giving clues to help the reader get the answer as well. (The goal when writi...more
Mystery isn't really L'Engle's forte; she's not very good at giving clues to help the reader get the answer as well. (The goal when writi...more
Mar 19, 2011
Kiirsi Hellewell
rated it
4 of 5 stars
·
review of another edition
Recommends it for:
Kids 11 +
I'm sure I must have read this book many years ago, because bits of it were somewhat familiar at times (and I love Madeline L'Engle and always read her books wherever I could find them). It's a good story...though a bit slow at times...and I always love to read more about the O' Keefes (I sure wish we could see more of Calvin and Meg as grown-ups, though). Simon and Aunt Leonis and many of the others are very endearing characters with a lot of depth. There's some beautiful descriptions, and most...more
Okay, so I have decided to read as many of Madeleine L'Engle's books as many they have in our small library here. I like her imagination at work, because even those books which are in a sort of series, even they could stand alone and be fantastic. And even the genre might change; some are fantastical creatures, some are a murder-mystery, some pure science fiction complete with time travel and such. She is definitely not boring in her writing, and can always surprize you in her plots. Also, her m...more
We meet Simon and his Aunt Lenois just before Simon is to board a ship with his long lost cousin. They're supposed to be taking a family painting to a museum overseas and Simon has decided it would be an interesting trip. However, before he even sets foot on board, he is almost killed in a very strange accident but is gracefully saved by a girl named Poly.
Simon quickly becomes friends with Poly and her brother Charles. They spend their days exploring the ship and staying out of trouble. Trouble...more
Simon quickly becomes friends with Poly and her brother Charles. They spend their days exploring the ship and staying out of trouble. Trouble...more
What ages would I recommend it too? – Eight and up.
Length? – A couple of evening's read.
Characters? – Memorable, several characters.
Setting? – Contemporary with a touch of fantasy.
Written approximately? – 1976.
Does the story leave questions in the readers mind? – Ready to read more.
Any issues the author (or a more recent publisher) should cover? No.
Short storyline: Simon meets Poly and Charles on a boat to deliver a painting to a foreign country. He doesn't know the danger he is caught up in. I...more
Length? – A couple of evening's read.
Characters? – Memorable, several characters.
Setting? – Contemporary with a touch of fantasy.
Written approximately? – 1976.
Does the story leave questions in the readers mind? – Ready to read more.
Any issues the author (or a more recent publisher) should cover? No.
Short storyline: Simon meets Poly and Charles on a boat to deliver a painting to a foreign country. He doesn't know the danger he is caught up in. I...more
I found this in the "throw away" pile at school last week. Really? How could anyone throw away a Madeleine L'Engle book? Since it was one I hadn't read as a kid I gave it a few pages and suddenly I could not put it down. This is a "who-dunnit" with an underlying story of how we all come to terms with our ancestry and who that makes us, with a little bit of "respect others who are not like you thrown in for good measure. Following the second generation of O'Keefes and a few new characters, we tak...more
Wasn't L'Engle's husband a soap actor? This story rolled over the waves with action-reaction from start to finish. It was a fun read, with all the drama and half the romance of the soaps.
L'Engle is always impressive with her eye for details and timeless relativity. You know that she's traveled on cargo ships and encountered South American policemen.
It was strange to read this after also reading (ack! what was the title? an Austin story... the daughter travels to Antarctica). There were so many s...more
L'Engle is always impressive with her eye for details and timeless relativity. You know that she's traveled on cargo ships and encountered South American policemen.
It was strange to read this after also reading (ack! what was the title? an Austin story... the daughter travels to Antarctica). There were so many s...more
I loved L’Engle as a kid, primarily because she wrote about magic and didn’t talk down to young adults. I resent the Wrinkle in Time parody, but as an adult I have to acknowledge that she can reach astonishing levels of triteness. This book’s a good example. Native Americans: good. Faceless oil executives: bad. Traditional healing: good. Biomedical model: bad.
On the other hand, it’s pretty progressive for young adult fiction circa 1965. Even if Meg Murry’s given up math to raise seven kids.
On the other hand, it’s pretty progressive for young adult fiction circa 1965. Even if Meg Murry’s given up math to raise seven kids.
This was a re-read for me. I did not remember a lot from the first time (20 years ago) though so there was still some intrigue and surprises. Simon Renier is taking a freighter from Charleston to Venezuela with a long lost cousin to donate a family heirloom to a Venezuelan museum. As is typical with the other books in the O'Keefe family series, nearly nothing goes as expected, and Simon's trip ends up being far more of an adventure than he had planned on.
This is a good book and can be enjoyed ev...more
This is a good book and can be enjoyed ev...more
I absolutely loved this book! I read Madeleine L'Engle's Time Quintet and one of the Austin Family books before I read this, and liked them very much. However, this is my new favorite of her books! I've always loved her books for their character development (they always seem so real!!), but the characters in Dragons in the Waters were the most amazing of all her characters. They had all the characteristics of normal people. They had pasts, awkward moments, prideful moments, humble moments, smart...more
This was a good book so far. I do love Madeline L'engles books because she always has some sort of mystery in her story line and for me she just draws me in. This was an interesting story though, the O'keefes and Simon on the same boat. I felt sad for Simon at first because since he doesn't have a lot of money and he's ling with his grandmother, he had to sell a family heirloom. Along with his cousin Forsyth they board the boat , but the cousin ends up dead and leaves a big mystery for the group...more
I love L'Engle, she's one of my favorite writers. And most of her novels are quite good. So when I rate this one three stars, really it is in relation to her other works, not that it is actually a mere average book. It simply isn't as good as her other ones.
Dragons in the Waters introduces us to Simon. Having lived with his 90 year old great aunt for several years, Simon has grown used to being poor, but rich in education as she is a very smart lady. But now she's releasing him to go on a trip w...more
Dragons in the Waters introduces us to Simon. Having lived with his 90 year old great aunt for several years, Simon has grown used to being poor, but rich in education as she is a very smart lady. But now she's releasing him to go on a trip w...more
I spent most of the time reading this trying to remember how the characters in this book related to those in A Wrinkle in Time and where the heck Simon's plantation in Charleston actually was. Madeleine L'Engle had quite a brain, didn't she? Nice adventure yarn, with a bit of the othernatural a la L'Engle and a small science course as well. And dragons, of sorts, even if only in hearts.
The descriptions of life aboard ship are fun, though I am skeptical that a freighter that carries a few passengers as well would have been so cruiselike & comfortable. The setting & cast of characters are lots of fun too. The plot has WAY too many coincidences, & it's extremely sentimental. But enjoyable & undemanding to reread when one is abed recovering from a nasty cold.
I was not especially thrilled with this one. I suppose it's a decent enough mystery, though there were too many loose ends that weren't tied up neatly at the end and there were a lot of things that came out of left field rather than being cleverly set in place by the author. More importantly, the characters that make it part of a series weren't really utilized that well. What was interesting was that this book links (in a tiny but very intentional way) to The Other Side Of The Sun which I wouldn...more
This whole series was very good - but not the absolute greatest of L'Engle. Still better than normal books, but if we are comparing L'Engle to her absolute best, we're going to have to go down one star here. But still awesome. All three in this series seemed to deal a lot on the importance of not idolizing individuals.
This looks like a children's book but I was surprised by its content. It's probably more for teenagers or older children since there is murder and infidelity as some of it's main subject. I'm not sure what else to say about this book. It was interesting and left an odd after taste. But I didn't necessarily not like it.
May 01, 2011
Jessica
rated it
3 of 5 stars
·
review of another edition
Shelves:
young-adult,
re-reads
I read this as part of a big L'Engle marathon one year. I knew I had read Dragons in the Waters as a kid but couldn't remember a THING about it, and rereading it made me realize why - it's a pretty interesting travel story, but not a lot happens in most of the book - I think it would be awfully dull to read as a kid.
The second book in L'Engle's O'Keefe family series, it was entertaining for a YA book. I like all of the life lessons, but I really want to slap the main O'Keefe character. I like that science is usually at the forefront of L'Engle's stories, and still is here, but it's paired with more mysticism than usual (with the younger O'Keefe's dreaming) which I thought was very interesting.
It's hard to rate this one. By any other author, I might give it a 4. But on my L'Engle scale it only gets a 3 because it just didn't grab me as much as many of her other books did. Glad I read it. Some really good stuff to think about regarding remembering the past, the idols that we hold on to, and knowing when you've found your place in the world. But the plot itself was a bit slow.
Simon Reiner was a very weird character and I took to the plot straightaway. The plot was very catching, but I have to say that the ending was a little confusing. Beside that, this book is very dramatic and makes you stop reading it and think.
Polly O'Keefe is now 14 and becomes involved with a murder mystery aboard a ship sailing to Venezuela. I enjoyed the characters of Simon & Leonis Phair and the Quiztano indians. Story indirectly ties with some of The Swiftly Tilting Planet.
An interesting story, Dragons in the Waters is a muddled reading experience. It is written in a scattered, far less cohesive way than the Wrinkle In Time series, and the same themes were covered in A Swiftly Tilting Planet.
Not one of Madeleine's better books. It sort of dragged on. The characters started strong, but the action fizzled by the middle of the book. It was nice to read about the O'Keefes again.
Reread. Not my favorite L'Engle book, but still enjoyable, though I liked the first half better. It's always good to see the recurring characters popping up throughout the L'Engleverse.
Madeline L'Engle has shocked me again with her amazing story. Once again she has caused me to fall in love with the children of her brain. This book is beautiful.
I read this back in junior high school. I remember being disappointed that there weren't any actual dragons in it, but I liked it a lot anyway. A good mystery.
I was actually a little disappointed because there weren't any dragons, only figurative ones, and I thought it was going to be a fantasy book.
I read this book to the kids. It ended up being a bit more sophisticated than I expected. Suspenseful and entertaining. Enjoyable read.
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Madeleine L'Engle was an American writer best known for her Young Adult fiction, particularly the Newbery Medal-winning A Wrinkle in Time and its sequels A Wind in the Door, A Swiftly Tilting Planet, and Many Waters. Her works reflect her strong interest in modern science: tesseracts, for example, are featured prominently in A Wrinkle in Time, mitochondrial DNA in A Wind in the Door, organ regener...more
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“That's a sure way to tell about somebody--the way they play, or don't play, make-believe.”
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Sep 05, 2011 05:32am