Artemis Fowl: The Time Paradox by Eoin Colfer

image from LibraryThing

Another great adventure with the boy genius, but this time it's two boy geniuses...and both are Artemis.

Artemis's mother is dying of a horrible disease that he himself infected her with by using magic to wipe her memory. If the guilt of that isn't enough - the only cure is brain fluid from an extinct animal that a younger Artemis sold into extinction.

The only solution is for Artemis and Holly Short to go back in time to the moment of the sale and rescue the Lemur.

As in all Artemis books, what sounds clear and easy is anything but. The young Artemis is a devious and conceited thing who is not easily swayed from his path, selling the Lemur to the Extinctionists for bucket loads of money.

Then in typical Colfer fashion there is a huge surprise!

This is a head scratching book, though.
If Artemis hadn't gone back in time, his mother may not have gotten sick, but because his mother was sick, he had to go back in time. Thus the paradox.

So, it got me thinking about time travel. Would I want to be able to go back and change things? Are there things I think I need to change? Hmm...

Artemis had the opportunity to try to alter a wrong - but that alteration created a much bigger wrong. So, how big a wrong would it need to be to justify the costs? I think I'm glad this is only hypothetical!!

State of Fear by Michael Crichton

image from LibraryThing

I haven't read a Michael Crichton book for a long time. This was just the book I needed to escape. My grandfather died this week and I wanted something to make me forget all the things I needed to do and relax. State of Fear is one of those books that you need to be fairly focused on - there are lots of things going on - because it makes you question what you thought you knew.

The basic premise is an environmental agency that is a money sucking hole and to convince people of the need to donate money to the global warming crisis - they create climate events to scare peoples' checkbooks open.

Peter Evans, a mild mannered lawyer, gets sucked into crisis by representing George Morton, an odd duck of an environmentalist and a very rich man. George begins to become disillusioned with NERF, the environmental group he is funding, and starts to ask many quesitons. Drake, the leader of the group, becomes suspecious and begins pressuring George to change his mind by threatening to kill him. After a drunken acceptance speech - George is killed in a fiery car crash.

Peter thinks things are over, but then he meets Kenner, George's accomplice and a naysayer for all things environmental. Actually, he isn't a naysayer - but a questioner. He pushes Peter to question all he knows about global warming by presenting studies and facts that contradict the general understanding. As Peter becomes more and more embroiled in whatever is happening with NERF, his life is threatened in the Anarctic, in the desert of the Southwest and finally on a little island in the Pacific - that one is the most gruesome - he learns there are still cannibals...

I really enjoyed this book. Although it helped me to escape - it also forced me to think about what I understand and what I believe. It made me believe that the only way to escape this state of fear is to trust in things that are not of this world! :)

Enjoy this!

ps - I read this outloud to Rod right after I finished! So - this should actually count as two books. I think I liked it even better the second time around!