Rating: 
Summary: Well Written, Heartfelt, Philosophical Novel
Review: I recently finished this book - CAMILLA - by Madeleine L'Engle. I had picked it out simply because L'Engle is one of my favorite authors and I hope to collect all - or most - or her works someday ... certainly I had not expected it to be so well written, with a total understanding of the thoughts, words, and actions of teenage girls, especially those with disagreeing parents. Which, of course, it was. Camilla Dickinson, the title character, is a girl in her middle teens whose father is a stern and undemonstrative architect, and whose mother always has a Jacques around. Camilla suspects that Mrs. Dickinson is seeing Jacques, but knows it for sure when she walks in on them kissing. CAMILLA is about this girl trying to deal with the fact that she is an individual - and nobody else is like her, and most may not be thinking about her as she is at her bedroom window, wondering if they are - and her parents are, too, individuals: Faulted and unique individuals, and she has to accept them as that. Her best friend is also going through parental disagreements. Her brother, Frank, takes an interest in Camilla and the two spend hours together. I especially like their special talks, where they philosophize about death, life, religion, and how their existence came about. The end, I felt, but satisfying but unexpected. I assure you, if you read this book, you will A) love it; and B) not be able to put it down until you've finished it. I urge you, in the name of good books, read it!
Rating:
Summary: Camilla was wonderful, but dissapointing.
Review: I think Camilla was a wonderful book, a real page turner, but the ending was dissapointing. I would reccomend this book to almost anyone. L'Engle should come up with a summary, but not every story has to have a happy ending.
Rating:
Summary: Beautiful Bildungsroman
Review: I've read "Camilla" during different stages in my life and have found new meaning in the novel each time. I have always loved the book for its rich imagery and descriptions of everything from New York's Central Park to a piano concerto by Prokofiev. I also love it for its strong protagonist, Camilla Dickinson, who can seem unbelievably perfect for a teenage girl. After all, she isn't just intelligent and sensitive, but she also has a sense of the cosmic and the beautiful. For instance, she reads the classics not because she is forced to at school but because she likes reading them.Another thing fascinating about the book is that each character has his or her own take on what Life is. These philosophies are great to take apart when analyzing each character's motivations. Madeleine L'Engle is good at writing books with many different characters because she can give each one a different take on Life (as she does here), on Death ("A Ring of Endless Light"), on Love ("A House Like a Lotus"), and on Existence and the Universe (any book in the Time Quartet). The plot is basically about how a young girl, in the course of a few weeks, becomes a young woman. The story is deeper and richer than that description, however. What makes "Camilla" stand out among other bildungsroman stories for young people is the fact that its protagonist's "growing pains" are less troubling and awful than usual, not because the author gave her a break, but because she had learned to cushion her fall into adulthood with a strong faith in the beauty and goodness in the Universe. If I could compare Camilla Dickinson to any other person, real-life or fictional, I would pick Anne Frank.
Rating: 
Summary: A Common Subject with Uncommon Attraction
Review: Just recently I finished the book, Camilla, by Madeleine L'Engle and although the topic of the story is a rather common one, I do have to admit that I simply could not put the book down at night-time, my usual reading hour. I remember it being two or three in the morning and I still had my eyes glued to each page. I know that, excepting a few others, I read most books quite slowly, trying to keep up with the story and making sure that I know what's going on, but with this one, I felt much different. I read faster than I thought that I ever could, so embraced in the story. I felt that if I put it down too soon, I would miss some of the best parts, but I soon found myself thinking, "Well, something new and exciting happens on every page, so if I put the book down too soon, I'm always guaranteed to miss something extraordinarily interesting." I soon found myself missing valuable hours of sleep simply to read this wonderful tale. I would highly recommend this story to any teenage girl or boy, mother, father, child, or others. I give this story 3 stars because of its unoriginal subject, but I can sure make an exception to read this exhilerating novel.
Rating:
Summary: Awsome!
Review: L'Engle shows some of the pressures of becoming a responsible adult. She tells the story of a young girl who needs to put her trust in someone other than her parents, for they have failed her. So young Camilla hangs on to her first love, tying to open up her eyes into a new and confusingly unknown world.
Rating:
Summary: OK, but not as good as I had expected
Review: This book describes the details of teenagers' mind well and I enjoyed this book until the middle of this book, but the ending was disappointing. And compared to "And both were young", it wasn't so organized.
Rating:
Summary: This is a very good book
Review: This book is very good, but I have something else to say, too: the last reader thought that there should be a second Camilla book. Well, I have good news: there is one! It's called 'A Live Coal in the Sea' and was published in 1996. I reccomend it!
Rating:
Summary: good book
Review: this is one of the best books I've read all summer.
Rating: 
Summary: Being alive is to be happy
Review: This was one of the few books I had not read by Madeleine L'Engle. As usual, it was excellent. Camilla is the story of Camilla Dickinson, a 15 year old living in New York City, right before the Vietnam War. It was written in 1965, and it was probably one of the first "coming of age" books. In the story, Camilla learns her parents are not the infallible beings she thought they were. She learns of their mistakes, their infidelities, their coldness, and she must learn to love them because of that. Camilla begins to see Frank, her best friend's older brother. She must learn to deal with her friend's jealousy and she must learn to understand these new feelings she has for Frank. Ms. L'engle approaches the topics of suicide, life, love, and religion with her usual sensitivity. Camilla is a character the reader will grow to care about and admire as she finds a more adult footing in the world.
Rating:
Summary: Being alive is to be happy
Review: This was one of the few books I had not read by Madeleine L'Engle. As usual, it was excellent. Camilla is the story of Camilla Dickinson, a 15 year old living in New York City, right before the Vietnam War. It was written in 1965, and it was probably one of the first "coming of age" books. In the story, Camilla learns her parents are not the infallible beings she thought they were. She learns of their mistakes, their infidelities, their coldness, and she must learn to love them because of that. Camilla begins to see Frank, her best friend's older brother. She must learn to deal with her friend's jealousy and she must learn to understand these new feelings she has for Frank. Ms. L'engle approaches the topics of suicide, life, love, and religion with her usual sensitivity. Camilla is a character the reader will grow to care about and admire as she finds a more adult footing in the world.
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