Artistic Adventures with Victoria

My dream with ‘The Adventures of Alexia and Phoebe’ was to create stories that would resonate with children all around the world. To achieve this, I intentionally left Alexia’s home location undefined. This wasn’t just about geographical ambiguity; it was about making every young reader feel that these adventures could be happening close to them. The series takes Alexia and Phoebe to a variety of global locations, each with its own unique charm, independent of where Alexia’s actual home might be. But in crafting this universal appeal, I forgot one crucial thing.

Playing with Time

Have you ever considered how time plays a role in my stories? In the upcoming adventure, which unfolds in the enchanting Great Lakes region of Africa, the concept of time zones emerges as a curious element in the story. Imagine it’s 10 am in London – the beginning of the day. In the Great Lakes region, it would be about 1 pm, depending on the time of year. This time difference is manageable if Alexia hails from London or even New York, where it would be 5 am. Even if they adjust their departure time slightly, Alexia and Phoebe have the ability to leave for their adventure and return all within the span of a single day, ensuring they’re back before dusk.

But the scenario shifts when viewed from Sydney. If Alexia and Phoebe start their journey at 10 am, it’s 1 am in the Great Lakes region – not exactly an ideal time for an adventure. Or is it? Could this be an exhilarating opportunity to introduce nocturnal encounters, like a lioness hunt? Well, I only included adorable lion cubs in the story, so no need to worry!

Distance is a trivial problem in our story, as Phoebe can open a ‘rainbow path,’ a magical bridge connecting two distant places. This path alters the conventional constraints of time and space, propelling Alexia and Phoebe into incredible adventures. But should it affect time as well? Could the rainbow paths enable time travel?

The Allure of Time Travel

This opens up fantastic possibilities. How about an adventure in the Jurassic era, meeting a T-Rex, perhaps?

However, time travel and quick travel are two very different things. Quick travel is a matter of perspective. For instance, in the early 19th century, the concept of human flight was pure fantasy. Yet, the Wright brothers achieved powered flight in 1903, paving the way for today’s rapid global air travel, once thought impossible. The ‘rainbow path’ in my stories is similar to this: a fantastical means of swift transportation. It’s comparable to what some might call an Einstein-Rosen Bridge, which is a fancy term for a wormhole, especially popular among Jane Foster fans from Thor.

But tampering with time opens a Pandora’s box of complications. So, for now, let’s keep that box closed. If I ever decide to venture into the era of dinosaurs, I can always tweak the narrative.

Navigating Time Zones: A Twist in the Tale

You might wonder why the time zone conflict in ‘The Adventures of Alexia and Phoebe’ only surfaced during the African adventure. This issue could have appeared in the second and third books. In the second, the island’s vague location renders time zones irrelevant. In the third, the Arctic Circle’s perpetual night conveniently masks any time-related discrepancies. I’d love to claim these were deliberate choices, but they were not. In reality, an error in timing a video upload led to these musings.

What should be done about this time conflict? Unfortunately, there’s not much I can do. Time, unyielding and unalterable, cannot be rewritten, and so this conflict remains in the story. Yet, therein lies the charm of storytelling: we learn, adapt, and perhaps one day, we may even find inspiration in our inadvertent errors.