Madeleine L’Engle, author of “A Wrinkle in Time,” passed away Thursday of natural causes. She was 88.

The novelist died of natural causes in Rose Haven nursing home in Litchfield, Connecticut, on Thursday, Sept. 6, said Jennifer Doerr, publicity manager for publisher Farrar, Straus and Giroux, as reported by the AP.

The New York City native wrote her first novel in 1945, the children’s book “The Small Rain.” She went on to write more than 60 books throughout her career, both for children and adults.

“A Wrinkle in Time,” published in 1962, won the American Library Association's 1963 Newbery Medal for best American children's book. “A Ring of Endless Light” was a Newbery Honor Book “(medal runner-up) in 1981.

The novelist was turned away by a dozen publishers before Farrar, Straus and Giroux agreed to publish “A Wrinkle in Time” in 1962. It instantly became a sensation. In 2003, Disney made a television adaptation of the book.

Ms. L'Engle was among the best-selling children's authors of her generation, but she also wrote poetry and memoirs.

Ms. L’Engle was born on October 29, 1918, in New York City. She graduated from Smith College in 1941 and worked as an actress, thus meeting her future husband, actor Hugh Franklin. The couple had one son, Bion and two daughters, Josephine and Maria. Maria was adopted when her parents, who were family friends, died.

Hugh Franklin played Dr. Charles Tyler on the soap opera “All My Children” for almost 13 years. He passed away in 1986, from cancer, while Bion died in 1999.

Ms. L’Engle taught at St. Hilda's & St. Hugh's School in New York between 1960 and 1966 and again in 1989-1990. Starting with 1965, the author volunteered as a librarian at the Cathedral of St. John the Divine, also in New York.

In 2004, President Bush awarded her a National Humanities Medal.