The Time Cavern [Paperback]

Todd A. Fonseca (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: October 9, 2009

The Mystery began a hundred years ago.
It was never solved.
Now it's happening again.

When ten-year-old Aaron moved from the big city to the country, he thought it was a boring sleepy town. Then he met Jake, a know-it-all farm girl who said his house was haunted. She claimed an Amish boy disappeared without a trace after hearing the wind call his name. Aaron thought she was just trying to scare him...until the night he heard his own name in the wind.

"Wow! What a terrific book - especially for young adult readers. What more could you ask for? Mystery, time travel, history - all rolled into one heck of a yarn." - Joseph Perrone Jr, author of As the Twig is Bent

"THE TIME CAVERN will stimulate and captivate the imagination of young readers, girls and boys alike. I urge parents and teachers to add this book to their libraries." - D. B. Pacini, author of The Loose End of the Rainbow

"The Time Cavern showcases masterful storytelling that will immediately be passed forward to one of my nephews. I highly recommend picking up a copy for the young explorers that you love." - Roy L. Pickering, author of Patches of Grey

Editorial Reviews

Review

[The Time Cavern] reminded me of Madeleine L'Engel's sci-fi/science-themed children's books - an intelligent youth literature combination of adventure, fantasy and science. -- Aileen Cho - Associate Editor, McGraw-Hill --This text refers to an alternate Paperback edition.

About the Author

Todd A Fonseca is the author of the juvenile fiction novel The Time Cavern which was named a finalist in the National Indie Excellence Awards. Book two in this acclaimed series - The Inverted Cavern - was released by Ridan Publishing in December 2011.  Mr. Fonseca lives in Minnesota with his wife and four boys.

Product Details

• Paperback: 214 pages
• Publisher: Ridan Publishing (October 9, 2009)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0982514514
• ISBN-13: 978-0982514511
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 6 x 0.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12.8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (72 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #235,145 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Growing up in the northern Indiana city of Mishawaka, Todd A Fonseca learned of the Amish culture through frequent family Sunday drives to rural Nappanee Indiana. This small town is home to a large Amish community. Those visiting the area experience the Amish through the town's shops and nearby Amish Acres.

During these early years, Fonseca's interest in the arts began with music. He became an accomplished accordionist participating in national competitions leading to a #4 placement in 1983. Fonseca has also performed in New York's Carnegie Recital Hall.

His high school career added drama to his resume. Having the role of curmudgeon Mr. Hassler in The Pajama Game, led to being cast as the lead in the production Jack and the Beanstalk.

At Marquette University, Fonseca received a Biomedical Engineering graduate degree. His professional career includes numerous positions in medical device companies. He is currently a senior clinical research director for a company researching deep brain stimulation for treating conditions such as Parkinson's Disease.

It is this eclectic mix of experiences with the Amish, the Arts, and Science that Fonseca has drawn upon to create The Time Cavern named a 2009 IE National Book Award Finalist.

For more information, visit the official website: www.thetimecavern.com.

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

53 of 56 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Time Travel so Good I Almost Forgot to Bring the Helium December 30, 2008

By Eric D. Knapp VINE™ VOICE

Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase

UPDATE: There's a new edition of The Time Cavern available, from Ridan Publishing. Product reviews show for all editions, so if you're on the "old" page make sure to click through.

The Time Cavern is a concise, well-written, and endearing story. It's highly suitable for young adult readers: it was mature and clever, yet not overly complex. As an adult, I also enjoyed the book quite a bit -- it reminded me of the Encyclopedia Brown books I used to read when I was a kid, where the hero won the day through intellect and keen observation.

The story is one of exploration and friendship, as Aaron and Jake investigate the source of mysterious voices on the wind, and become entangled in the associated legend of an Amish boy who disappeared one hundred years ago. The story takes place in the quiet farmlands of Amish country, and Aaron learns about the Amish as he plays junior detective. The two friends' adventures are challenged by everything from the rural expansiveness of the country (how does a ten year old kid get all the way into town to look up a census report?) to various riddles involving chemistry, astronomy, mechanics, and history. While the plot might seem a bit obvious to an adult reader, there are definite twists to keep younger audiences enthralled. The characters are well defined and extremely likable, and reading the book invoked a feeling of tense exploration, just like what Aaron and Jake must have felt as they first entered the Time Cavern.

In a nutshell: wonderful, creative, and inspiring!

Character: 5
Creativity: 5
Plot: 4
Setting / Descriptions: 5
Entertainment: 5
Suitability to Audience: 5

Overall rating: 5 stars

An additional note for time-travel enthusiasts (I'm one myself, having written my own time travel novel) -- the Time Cavern introduces us to what might just be the most original time machine concept ever - not to give anything away, but if you're a nut about time-travel, this is worth for that alone.

22 of 24 people found the following review helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars The Time Cavern is a Journey You Won't Soon Forget! June 25, 2008

By Shannon L. Yarbrough VINE™ VOICE

Format:Paperback

I immediately think of the phrase, "judging a book by its cover," as I write this. Face it. We all do it, which is all the more reason for an author like Todd Fonseca to spend so much time on the cover of The Time Cavern. It is both appealing and eye catching. I hope that Todd's hard work pays off because readers will definitely not be disappointed with what's behind this cover.

As the story unfolds, the reader is introduced to a ten year old boy named Aaron who is camping on his own for the first time. Of course, all ten year olds have a wild imagination and long for a sense of independence, so Aaron immediately begins to worry about the sounds he hears outside the tent. He also senses that he is being watched. Fonseca dedicates the book to his own son, also named Aaron. As I nestled into the story, I imagined the author creating this story as a bedtime tale for his son. If that is the case, the author has done an excellent job of transpiring his story to the page.

Aaron decides to investigate the noises outside the tent, but before doing so, he records his thoughts in a notebook. Here, we learn that Aaron is actually camping in the backyard of his new home, in which his family just moved into the day before. The beginning of the story is set up as a nice metaphor for the entire book. You may be frowning at the thought of yet another time travel story based on the title alone, but the young protagonist leaving a big concrete city and moving to the corn fields of Amish country makes for a nice set-up in my opinion which many young readers can relate to.

Fonseca has a talent for appealing to a young audience in the use of his subject matter....independence, moving to a new home, making friends, being afraid, exploration, and the use of the imagination, etc. Outside of the young boy's adventures the author also uses a nice mix of dialog to keep his story moving, evenly exposing the reader to other characters including Aaron's parents.

Aaron soon forms a friendship with a neighboring girl named Jake, who tells him his house is haunted. This sends Aaron into a frenzy to investigate the noises he's been hearing, along with the mysterious eyes he sees in the old family barn. While exploring the barn, Aaron finds the page from a diary of a young boy who lived over 100 years ago. The writings on the page echo the mysterious feeling Aaron has been experiencing..."hearing your name being called by the wind."

The next day, Aaron seeks out Jake to ask her about what she had said about his house and what she might know about the mysterious wind. He shows her the diary page he found and the two begin a journey they will not soon forget as they set out to solve the mystery of the Amish boy who wrote the diary entry, the howling wind that whispers your name, and an ancient cavern filled with even more secrets.

Todd Fonseca's book is an adventure story that both kids and adults will love. It feeds the imagination, just as the tale itself builds upon the eagerness of its characters to solve the mystery. Fonseca's main characters, Aaron and Jake, are believable and come alive on the page through their real-life dialog and eagerness to learn the truth. The author does a great job of keeping the momentum going with nicely paced conflict and interest, which will definitely keep the pages turning.

24 of 27 people found the following review helpful

2.0 out of 5 stars had potental, but... March 3, 2010

By TAP

Format:Paperback

This book was on a recommended reading list for 5th grade boys. I wish I could remember what list so I'll know to ignore it next time. I read aloud to my kids a lot and so we read this one.

This book had potential. It had concepts that any 11-year-old boy would be interested in and issues they can all relate to. The author has good storytelling instincts. Unfortunately, he lacks craft. (If the author should read this, I'd like to say that craft can be learned, but storytelling can not. You have talent. You just need to learn to write. Get a book. Take a class. Write a good book next time.)

The book was filled with little mistakes; sentences that didn't make sense, words that were in the wrong form, typos, etc. I found the use of the same boring word like big or large used twice in a sentence and multiple times in a single paragraph extremely distracting, and careless. The author's tendency to switch back and forth between the point of view character was confusing. I don't like reading a badly written book to my kids because it teaches bad writing.

Worst of all, the author fails to follow through on his themes. His primary theme is about the desire of a pre-adolescent to obtain greater personal freedom conflicting with a parent's fear that the child doesn't yet have the sense of responsibility to justify said freedom. The author begins to show the hero of the story learning that being honest with his parents and following through with promises is earning him greater freedom. But as the story continues, the hero just finds better ways to lie, even when the truth could have gotten him what he wanted. In the end, he doesn't learn. The idea that a hero learns and grows into a better person is important in any literature, but even more so in children's literature. Even my 11-year-old son picked up on this. He said he did not like the main character because he was rude to his parents (even though he is very polite in the pleas and thank you way) and he lied when he didn't need to.

This book came so close to being good, but because of lack of writing skill, it just didn't make it.