The Mysterious Disappearance

Original cover of the book

The Book of Time" by Guillaume Prévost narrates the story of Sam a curious boy in his intent of finding his missing father; the story starts by telling the reader that its Sam´s birthday and he has a judo match, which ends up being cancelled... Three years ago Sam Fulkner´s mom died in a car crash, he and his father, Allan,  moved in with his grandparents and his cousin Lily due to the fact that his father wasn’t in the condition to take care of his son by himself anymore. When they moved, Sam had to leave everything he had in his old neighborhood plus the grieve he had of his dead mother; so to keep his mind out of sorrow, he started with skateboarding, with judo and uses his wits to fend off bullies in his surroundings, especially he needs them with Monk, a computer genius, judo-champion that has a serious problem with Sam. Moreover, Allan Faulkner has been missing for more than a week, which is not un-normal for him because he tends to do it but never for too long. Sam gets worried and decides to go find him; he begins with his father´s old bookstore, but after hours of useless search he goes to the little apartment nearby that his father also owns. He goes down to the basement and notices that is smaller than before; he finds a strange stone statue and coin in the corner of the room but when he places the coin in the center of the statue, he is transported to Viking-era in Scotland with no explanation...

In page four, the author state a quote that catched my eye the moment I read it because it had something in it that allowed me to make connections to my real life; "...Allan seemed almost to be living in another world. At first Grandma claimed it was grief, and that he would get over it in time; yet three years after the car crash, they had to admit it was getting worse. (Guillaume 4)" The image of many of my friends came to my mind when I read this quote, eventhough something similar hasn’t happened to me, thank God for that, the stories I have heard where parents aren’t able to stay strong for their daughters or sons, after a catastrophe like this happens its devastating. The worst part of all this is the ones that end up being the most affected are the kids were, with the little time they have lived they have to suffer grieve not only from one parent but also from the other that isn´t there for them. Yet, Sam´s story has been the saddest I hear because he loves his father but he is continuously disappearing and Sam gets stuck in a situation that he is not supposed to live at a young age because he has to deal with the worries he has plus the fact that his father is missing and praying that nothing bad happens to him. As a daughter, the worst feeling is when you think that your parents are focus more on other thinks but not on you because children need the presence of their parents eventhough some may denied it cause they have been the ones that have give us everything we got and teach us everything we know because it weren’t for them we shouldn’t be the persons we are today. 

Moving on with the story, father Abbot, a monk Sam meets when he arrives strangely at the island, said a statement to Sam that I do no agree completely: "God is testing us, my boy! We may have to fight. But tonight the horizon is clear, and we can sleep peacefully. (Guillaume 22)" I am a catholic person and when I read this I thought it has nothing wrong with it, but then I realize the part were it said "the horizon is clear" it was like what; that when I started analyzing it. Many people talk about God in a certain way but the religion is not a supermarket where you go and pick the things you want and the ones that don’t fit your expectations you leave them there.  Maybe is that the words are not chose correctly but it also happens that people tend to talk about God in a positive way, but then they say something it has nothing to go with it because instead of saying something like "if got God by our side nothing is going to go wrong" or "the lord is going to give me the strength I need to overcome my difficulties"; they choose to mix it with something out of context because when they say there word I mention before, they are contradicting themselves because they are saying that they trust nature more than God. That’s my interpretation of the quote, maybe I am wrong but that is what happens when something is not explain correctly because it gives path for people to think something that the author was not trying to express.

I found out that the purpose of Guillaume Prévost to write this trilogy was to help children see how history could be fascinating and they can imagine things and be creative with it, he even based the central characters in his own children. Eventhough am not so advanced in the book, I could tell the everything in the book was put in by a reason and each time I go further and further in the book I´m able to imagine the characters and the settings thanks to the awesome characterization and imagery used to narrate the book. I am starting to really like this book; at the beginning if was kind of slow and boring but the more I read the more catching it become because it includes fantasy and suspense which are two characteristics in a book that I search for. I have also learned from this book so far, because right now Sam is in an island in Ireland that I have never even heard of and from the descriptions of the book it seems like a place full of history and adventure. I predict that Sam is going to find his father at the end, but as every good book is not going to be revealed until the end, meanwhile Sam is going to have adventures, meet knew people and learn what really happened to his father by clues given by people in the places he is going to go.