Author Madeline L’Engle, best known for her Newbery Award-winning novel “A Wrinkle in Time,” died last Friday at a nursing home in Litchfield, Connecticut. She was 88.

The author of more than 60 works of literature, including fantasy, poetry and memoirs, L’Engle’s deeply spiritual writing often highlighted her Christian faith. Although considered a children’s author by the press and publishing world, L’Engle disagreed with that label.

“I never write for any age group in mind,” she said in a 1993 Associated Press interview. “When you underestimate your audience, you’re cutting yourself off from your best work.”

Born in 1918, L’Engle graduated from Smith College in 1941. She worked as an actress in New York City, where she met her husband, Hugh Franklin, an actor on the soap opera

“All My Children.” They had a son and two daughters, one adopted. Franklin died of cancer in 1986. Their son, Boon, died in 1999.

In 1945, L’Engle’s first book, “A Small Rain,” was published. She later worked for many years as the writer in residence and librarian for the Episcopal Cathedral Church of St. John The Divine in New York City.

“A Wrinkle In Time,” which quotes great literary figures such as Euripides, Dante and Shakespeare, is the story of a teenage girl and her younger genius brother who must traverse the universe to search for their scientist father.

Together, they and Calvin, a neighbor, travel through a time-corridor and battle the ruling powers in a totalitarian government, similar to George Orwell’s “1984.” The novel won a Newbery medal in 1963 for Best American Children’s Book.

The characters’ adventures are further chronicled in the novels “A Wind in the Door” (1973)“A Swiftly Tilting Planet”(1978) which won an American Book Award, and “Many Waters”(1986).

In 2004, L’Engle was awarded a National Humanities Medal by President Bush.

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