Going, Going, Gone

Three middle schoolers travel back in time on a madcap adventure with the help of a library book in this laugh-out-loud start to the brand-new series, In Due Time.

Going, Going, Gone opens in the library at Sands Middle School where strange things are happening. Vikings burst out of bookcases, Albert Einstein appears out of nowhere, and is that Jackie Robinson tossing a baseball in the corner of the room?

When Librarian Valerie Tremt tells three students that one of the library books, The Book of Memories, is actually a time travel portal, the kids don’t believe her at first. But when they ask to see a dinosaur as proof and suddenly there is a terrifying T-Rex in the library, they realize she isn’t kidding around.

Now that he can time travel, twelve-year-old Matt knows exactly where he wants to go. In the summer of 1951, Matt’s grandfather Joe was on the path to becoming a major league baseball player. But at a 4th of July BBQ, Joe danced a little too close to the edge of a swimming pool and—splash!—he fell in and hurt his ankle. What should have been a minor injury turned out to be a career-ending one. Always the optimist, Joe used to say, “Because of the accident, I met the girl I was going to marry, so it was all worth it.”

Matt wants to go back in time to prevent the accident from ever occurring, so his grandfather can have the career he deserved! But can he successfully alter his grandfather’s past without changing his own future? Only time will tell…

At 110 years old, Nicholas O. Time is a retired physics professor and the oldest player in the North American United Soccer League. He built his first time machine when he was twelve, successfully sending his pet mouse back to the Stone Age. Unfortunately, a glitch in the machine caused the mouse to clone upon return. After several trials, Nick’s parents destroyed the machine and adopted a thirty-pound feline named Barney to address the growing rodent problem. Nick and his wife, Rose Maryann, have one son, Justin.

Stephen Gilpin graduated from the NYC School of Visual Arts where he studied painting and cartooning. He is the illustrator of the Who Shrunk Daniel Funk series and The Extraordinary Adventures of Ordinary Boy series. Stephen currently lives in Hiawatha, Kansas. Visit him at SGilpin.com.