Hi,

I am about to post chapter four of A Children’s Crusade on to the site. Apologies for late posting this month, my plan remains to post a new chapter roughly every two weeks, and as there are twenty two in this book, you should have the whole thing by the end of 2016.

The chapter is called ‘History Lesson’, after the central conceit, which takes a lesson given to the Children about Earth’s recent history (from our standpoint, future history), and uses it as a metaphor for life lessons learned (specifically by Marta), during the action. We also learn something more about the dominant indigenous species, as our heroine, following up on her suspicion that the pseudo-crustaceans are smarter than they look, decides to conduct behavioural research on one of them!

My speculations on a possible future history of the United States act as a way into the action. Despite any appearance to the contrary, I’m not in any way anti-American. I’m a fairly frequent visitor, and a great admirer of the American Constitution and the ideals it embodies. Readers should see the political aspects of this chapter as an outsider’s contribution to (and comment upon), the ongoing cultural debate within America.

As a sidebar to this, I’d also like to point out that I’m also an admirer of another great American institution, the US National Park Service, which I volunteered for during the summer of 2013.

Happy Reading