About Time: A tetralogy for 10-15 year olds

By Jeff Hunt

Four varied, interesting and educational stories for children to young adults.

A comic meeting with ancient scientists.

A meeting with the Maoris who sold Wellington Harbour to the Pakehas.

A tale of tiime travel to the land of Jesus.

And a young person's meeting with a horrible monster who may be something else.

• Language: English
• Publisher: BookRix
• Release date: Feb 8, 2020
• ISBN: 9783748728948

Book preview

About Time

This is a tetralogy of stories intended for the entertainment and edification of young adults. Three of them assume some aspect of time travel. Whilst this is a fun literary technique, it is very unlikely that anything like time travel will ever exist. It would require putting every bit of energy and matter in the universe back as it was at some previous time. An impossibly large task, even if it was theoretically possible.

The Point Less Party

Miriama

Pearson’s Machine

The Monster

The Point Less Party

Professor Eunice Less (‘Euce Less for short – but please don’t call me that’) of the Meticulous Advisers to the Department of Scientists (‘MAD Scientists for short – but please don’t call us that’) had an idea. This was not unusual, she had many ideas, and some were quite good, but this was really quite special.

I think we should organise a social event for all the really great scientists who have contributed to the world’s knowledge, she said.

Her assistant Doctor Daniel Douglas Lyon (Dan D. Lyon for short) was sceptical. They’re mostly dead, he said.

Solutions, not problems, said Eunice, who was a very determined young woman although not always completely practical. We are scientists. We don’t give up our endeavours at the first minor setback.

So the invitations were sent out to the many great people who had contributed over the centuries to the advance of science and the response was quite satisfactory. Many leading scientists were delighted to come to a picnic and party at the local beach spot named after Eunice’s paternal grandmother Fanny Rose Tessa who had been famous for her health foods (FRT Less Foods).

The day at Point Less would be a fun day of beach and relaxation while the local reporter reported. And then there would be a formal evening get together where these famous people got together.

There had been difficulties. Even Eunice gave up on sending invitations to the discoverers of fire and wheels. There seemed to be no written language and therefore no telephone books for her to search in. She went on looking until Dr Lyon pointed out that there were no telephones and possibly no language and so although it rankled with her she gave up on wheels and fire. Professor Less was very annoyed, for as I have explained she was a very determined young woman, but Dr Lyon was very relieved because he didn’t now how to write an invitation in a language that might not exist.

Communicating with Ancient Greeks was better. Good written records and addresses and she received a very nice reply from Archimedes and Aristotle who felt that being ancient history was much less fun than they had anticipated and they wanted to go to a picnic.

After that it was really quite easy. Nicolaus Copernicus, Johannes Kepler, Tycho Brahe, Atonie van Leeuwenhoek, Galileo Galilei, Robert Boyle, Isaac Newton, Alessandro Volta, John Dalton, Michael Faraday, Charles Darwin, Alfred Russel Wallace, Louis Pasteur, Marie Curie, Ernest Rutherford, Alfred Wegener, Albert Einstein, and Rosalind Franklin, all RSVPed in a quite punctual and polite way.

Apologises were received from Francis Bacon, Rene Descartes, Ada Lovelace, James Chadwick, J.J. Thomson, Daniel Bernoulli, Hipparchus, Ptolomy, Heinrich Hertz, Henry Cavendish, Linus Pauling, Blaise Pascall, James Waton, Maurice Wilkins, William Thomson, Francis Crick, Carl Linnaeus, Leonardo da Vinci, Thomas Edison, James Watt, Gregor Mendel, Alexander Fleming, Robert Hook, Antoine Lavoisier, Nikola Tessla, Max Planck, Niels Bohr, Alexander Graham Bell, James Clerk Maxwell, William Pickering, and Stephen Hawking who all claimed prior commitments. Eunice was not pleased by this and wanted to know what prior commitments historic people could have, but since no one she asked was historic the answers were unsatisfactory.

Tim Berners-Lee regretted that although he invented the internet which has done much to advance modern communication and society in general, he is still alive. He said he would feel uncomfortable in such illustrious departed company. Eunice complained bitterly that she did not feel that being alive was an adequate reason to turn down one of her invitations and threw the reply in her rejects basket called ‘the black hole’.

And so the grand day arrived.

Louis Pasteur was first off of the Historic Scientists Excursion bus holding his nose. "Well done me for establishing the role of micro-organisms and making the world aware