Rating – Five Stars
Derrer sets the fantasy scenario for this manuscript in the 25th century. He weaves an intriguing and thoughtfully designed narrative that successfully integrates quantum physics, time travel, and family adventure. The patriarch of the family is Max Planck, who designed a quantum-physics time machine—controlled by the mastermind “Jeeves,” the all-knowing, all-seeing, all-intelligent android computer. Of note, the patriarch is a direct descendant of the Max Planck—German theoretical physicist, who developed the fundamentals of quantum mechanics in the early 20th century.
The Planck family’s goal is to visit Egypt during the 18th Dynasty in Thebes (about 1310 BC) during the co-regency of the ailing Amenhotep III and his young son Amenhotep IV, King Tutankhamun’s father. Historians aver that this time was one of the most turbulent and complex periods of ancient Egypt, exacerbated by holding the Israelites in slavery and their demands for freedom laced with horrific threats from their God.
At the time, the volcano Thera on the island Santorini was erupting violently. A monstrous Plinian column rose thousands of feet. Northwest winds battered Egypt with gale force tempests containing acid rain, toxic gasses, and tephra from the volcano. Subsonic eruptions periodically racked the kingdom. These calamities were the precursor of the 10 plagues that lacerated Egypt. The family wanted to observe (unseen) how the co-regency dealt with these vexing problems.
Using invisibility suits, they plant telecommunicative bugs in various temples and in the royal palace. They witnessed religious rites of human sacrifice, revelry, and drunken orgies to placate the god of war, Sekhmet, who was believed to be responsible for the plagues, but to no avail. The bugs transmitted images of the strikingly beautiful Nefertiti, wife of Amenhotep IV, and Moses and Arron demanding that Amenhotep IV release the Children of Israel from slavery. Moses delivered his ultimatum, “Let my people go. If you do not, the angel of death will strike down all the first-born of Egypt, man and animal, in a night.”
I was particularly impressed with Derrer’s scientific explanations of the cause of the plagues. No giveaway here.
They also witnessed the Israelis crossing the Sea of Reeds (usually and erroneously referred to as the Red Sea), and the pursuing Egyptian army destroyed by a tsunami wave.
I’m not an avid fan of science fiction. Nevertheless, I thoroughly enjoyed this narrative, and I enthusiastically recommend it.