Frantastic Voyage

By Jim Benton

Goosebumps and Bill Nye the Science Guy fans, meet Franny!

Franny’s faithful Lab assistant, Igor, has swallowed a doomsday device that is ready to go off at any moment! For a regular scientist, it might seem like there’s only one way to get the device out—um...make that two ways.

But Franny K. Stein is no ordinary scientist, so she concocts her own way to get the device back and save her friend. With her miniaturization machine, Franny shrinks herself to the size of a pin and goes on a field trip like no other...through the body of a ticking time-dog! Fasten your seat belts, it’s going to be a bumpy ride!

• Language: English
• Publisher: Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers
• Release date: Jun 18, 2013
• ISBN: 9781442495203

Jim Benton

Jim Benton is a New York Times bestselling author and the creator of many licensed properties, including It's Happy Bunny. He's created a kids' TV series, designed clothing, and written the bestselling series Dear Dumb Diary, as well as Catwad and Franny K. Stein. Jim lives in Detroit with his spectacular family.

Book preview

CHAPTER ONE

FRANNY’S HOUSE

The Stein family lived in the pretty pink house with lovely purple shutters down at the end of Daffodil Street. Everything about the house was bright and cheery. Everything, that is, except the upstairs bedroom with the tiny round window.

Behind this window was Franny’s room, which was also her laboratory.

Even for a mad scientist, Franny’s lab was unusual. Her experiments and inventions were far beyond those of your average, everyday mad scientist.

In fact Franny’s work was so complicated that she found she could not do it alone. She had a lab assistant named Igor.

Well, he wasn’t a pure lab. He was also part poodle, part Chihuahua, part beagle, part spaniel, part shepherd, and possibly part some kind of weasly thing that probably wasn’t even a dog.

Franny had been through a lot with Igor, and he had learned a great deal about mad science working with Franny in her laboratory.

But Igor was still awfully young and Franny was still nervous about letting him work on any of the more dangerous projects.

CHAPTER TWO

FRANNY LOSES FACE

Franny remembered the time that she was working on a device that would make bite-size jelly doughnuts with the press of a button, but Igor got the dimensions wrong and she wound up filling the entire school with jelly.

Then there was that time Franny was trying to create a beautiful new kind of striped

Reviews for Frantastic Voyage

[bookconcierge · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Franny K. Stein is a mad scientist (is there any other kind?), with a lab assistant named Igor (not a pure bred lab, but also part Chihuahua, part poodle, part beagle, etc). But Igor is not very competent and usually messes up her experiments. When he accidentally swallows the Doomsday Device she built for emergencies, Franny has to find a way to retrieve the bomb from the dog’s stomach. So she shrinks herself and takes a tour through Igor’s innards. Will she get to the bomb in time to save the world? And how will she get out of Igor and back to her laboratory?

This is a fun series for the younger set. I like that Franny is always thinking and experimenting. And I like how Benton mentions that her mom can “cook, read, and change the oil in the car.”

[ieliasson_2 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Frantastic Voyage by Jim Benton is one in a series, Franny K. Stein, Mad Scientist, which is geared to 8-10 year old children. The titled protagonist is our antihero inventor/mad scientist who lives in her lab/attic bedroom in the Stein family home. Her scientific experiments are all towards creating new technologies, such as her Doomsday Device and Shrinkerizer. Her lab assistant and dog, Igor, swallows the gumball sized Doomsday Device, and to save the world and Igor, Fran puts on her special suit and miniaturizes herself with the Shrinkerizer. Fran enters Igor’s stomach via his nostril, and the adventures that transpire are hilarious. Today’s readers are inundated with technology, so the impact of imagined innovations in technology with large doses of humor and copious illustrations in pen, ink, and watercolor add up to kid’s science fiction at its most accessible. Benton is truly ingenious as he slips in the scientific method, analytical reasoning, and even media literacy messages into a very funny and believable story with imaginary technologies that are scientifically plausible. The framework established by Benton in the Franny K. Stein, Mad Scientist series is reasonable and coherent formula for scientific fun and imaginative exploration, and Frantastic Voyage is an exemplar of Benton’s oeuvre.