The Joys of Love
The Joys of Love
The Joys of Love
Léna Roy, Madeleine L'Engle
During the summer of 1946, twenty-year-old Elizabeth is doing what she has dreamed of since she was a little girl: working in the theatre. Elizabeth is passionate about her work and determined to learn all she can at the summer theatre company on the sea where she is an apprentice actress. She’s never felt so alive. And soon she finds another passion: Kurt Canitz, the dashing young director of the company, and the first man Elizabeth’s ever kissed who has really meant something to her. Then Elizabeth’s perfect summer is profoundly shaken when Kurt turns out not to be the kind of man she thought he was.Moving and romantic, this coming-of-age story was written during the 1940s. As revealed in an introduction by the author’s granddaughter Léna Roy, the protagonist Elizabeth is close to an autobiographical portrait of L’Engle herself as a young woman—“vibrant, vulnerable, and yearning for love and all that life has to offer.”

Book Details

Genre: 

  • Fiction
  • Juvenile Fiction
  • Romance

Age Level: 

  • 12 and up
Profile Picture

It is the summer of 1946, and twenty-year-old Elizabeth is living a dream at a summer theatre, where she gets to help out, practice her acting skills, take classes, and even meet some notable actors and actresses of the day. She has found friendship with others interning at the theatre, and even sprouted a summer romance that has her happier than she has ever been. However, her Aunt Harriet, a stern woman with whom she has lived since her father's death, decides to withdraw her approval, and thusly her money.

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