Jason and the Argo (ePub)

My book is a story for young adults who like science fiction along the line of the Anne McCaffrey Dragonrider series but without perhaps the great leaps in time between novels and generational leaps between characters.

It tells of space vacationers who get caught in a solar storm and find themselves having to join their damaged ship with an alien vessel which similarly got caught in the storm and damaged. Joining both ships together they are able to navigate and enter a wormhole the aliens (called "Tralians") have been using for time and space travel. Unfortunately, the wormhole was affected by the solar storm, and instead, they end up back in the Bronze Age and witness the destruction of Sodom and Gomorra by the alien navigator accidently hitting the button to their photon torpedo. (I throw in a bunch of history hoping to educate the readers or at least pique their curiosity to read up on history further.)

They try again and this time end up at the right time, but on a planet far away from either the Tralians' home or earth and are stuck on it until the wormhole dies down and they can travel safely through it. The Tralians estimate this will occur in about two hundred and fifty years. This gives me time to have them establish a community.

The indigenous life on this planet consists of intelligent, mobile and highly spiritual vegetation (called "Emmerinians"). The Emmerinians have a prophecy about someone coming to repair the damage done to their planet by previous visitors. One of their young "sprouts" is found to have the ability to talk with the visitors. The Elders wonder if this might presage a fulfillment of the prophecy, but they bide their time and observe. I throw in the spiritual aspect kind of sneakily, the way C. S. Lewis did in the hopes of exposing youth to the wonder and necessity of God. I think this is something that is woefully lacking in youth today as evidenced by the high rate of teen suicides and mass shootings. They need to be reached somehow.

The Tralians have been (harvesting) extinct life forms from the earth hoping to populate a "zoo" back on their home world. These plants and animals (yes, of course, including dinosaurs), along with the modern forms that were carried on the humans' ship for food are all welcomed by the Emmerinians.

The highly technical aliens have to develop solar powered "everything's" because the Emmerinians (being wood) are mortally afraid of fire and refuse to let them use oil and gas because that would be desecrating their ancestors. The environment will thus remain pure and pristine.

Everyone has to work together to create a new workable ecosystem for the good of all.

Some boring background is realistically needed to cover the establishment of government, industry and food production but I try to work this in as painlessly as possible. This exposes some of the various forms government can take hopefully showcasing the better aspects.

Part II consists of the previous generation having adult children and the towns and, agriculture etc. being well developed. One of the characters "Rory" has discovered ruins which were left by the previous visitors. He discovers that those visitors were also Tralians. The current Tralians have been keeping themselves aloof up in the mountains maintaining a "Greek god" form of lifestyle because they knew this all along. Rory discovers further that there is a population of "Rogue Trees" living in the north which is being affected by a pollution accident from a nuclear reactor left by the previous Tralians which were then asked to leave. Rory and the current Tralians come up with a solution to cure the Rogues and clean up the reactor spill and are thus allowed to remain on the planet for as long as they want.