I haven't read a book that I liked in a long time, but as you may know, I just turned 12 a few
days ago. My father borrowed a new book from the library, called
George's Cosmic Treasure Hunt. It is about a boy named George whose
friend's father, Eric, is a genius on the universe and its wonders. He
even built a supercomputer (Cosmos), but it ended up crashing by
mistake. When George's friend, Annie, manages to boot up Cosmos, she
found a message involving a recently landed Mars space probe. George,
Annie, and Emmett, a smart but annoying boy, manage to find other clues
at different locations in the universe, all with the same ending: Earth
would be destroyed if the clues were not followed.
The story
starts out in the Atlantis space shuttle where George, the main
protagonist, is the commander of the shuttle. He gets nervous during the
final moments before the shuttle finally takes off. He thinks of his
family and friends he will be leaving. After the shuttle takes off, he
sees that it is going into space upside-down and panics, but his pilot
reassures him that they are safe. The shuttle finally emerges into
space, and a very bright light is up ahead... but it turns out to be
Annie Bellis, his best friend, shining a flashlight at his face. It was
all a dream!
Next, George is having quite a difficult time
choosing a costume to wear to a space-themed party hosted by Eric,
Annie's father and a space genius who works at the Global Space Agency.
In the end, George chooses a costume that resembled what appeared to be a
shadow on Mars, but was actually an illusion formed by a rocky mass.
At
the party, George tried to figure out what all the other costumes were
supposed to be, but failed. He sees Annie and tries to guess what her
costume was, guessing that it was a black hole, but Annie says her
costume was dark matter. Soon, Eric arrives as what he says as "the only
intelligent life-form in the universe." George tells him not to say
that, or some of the scientists would get mad at him. However, Eric
dismisses this, saying that this "only intelligent life-form" is a human
being. He then asks his friends to explain their costumes for George,
as well as to write down their favorite parts of working in the field of
science.
After the party was over, Eric and his family announced
that they would be moving to Florida (as they were currently living in
England). He gave George a copy of The User's Guide to the Universe,
which he compiled from various scientists' essays and explanations. The
following day, George and Annie waved their final goodbyes before Annie
left for America.
Time passed, and Annie invited George to come
and visit America. Not wanting his parents to know, he e-mailed his
grandmother about the trip and agreed to send her to America. When
"Gran", as she was called, came the next day, George's parents objected,
saying it was too expensive, but Gran immediately says she has lots of
money stored under the floorboards of her house. So while George,
accompanied by Gran, would be going to Florida to visit his friends, his
parents would be going on an eco-tour to the Pacific Islands, which are
being threatened due to rising sea levels.
Upon George's arrival
in Florida, Annie ducked under the rail and hugged him. She stated that
there is an emergency, but also warned George not to tell anyone.
George met Emmett, a short but intelligent young boy who always seemed
to get on Annie's nerves ever since his parents left him with Annie's
family.
Once everyone got to Annie's house, she directed George
to climb the tree in her front yard, so that she could tell him a
secret. It turns out she was able to reboot Cosmos, a supercomputer that
had stopped working a couple of years ago, and there was a message that
she had suspected had come from aliens. Upon hearing this, Emmett, who
was listening from the base of the tree, immediately objected that there
were aliens in the universe due to the lack of evidence. After Emmett
stopped talking, Annie explained that a while ago, her family had
watched a Mars probe go through some rough moments during landing, and
that it was not acting properly.
Late at night, Annie and George
went downstairs and onto the veranda, where Annie showed George the
message. It appeared to mean that someone had to get to the Mars rover
before it was too late. If they didn't arrive in time, Earth would be
destroyed. After another of Annie's stories about how she found out
about the "message", Eric sent the two back to bed.
The next day,
George received a phone call that his parents arrived at Tuvalu, one of
many stops during their eco-mission in the Pacific Islands. After this,
George and Annie were in the bathroom discussing the picture and found
out what it all means. Susan, Annie's mom, decided that they needed a
quiet day at home rather than showing George around the town. After all,
the next day would be the highlight of George's entire trip.
The
group was going to see a space shuttle launch, which was a big help for
Annie, as she, along with George, was going to Mars with the help of
Cosmos, the supercomputer mentioned earlier that could also send people
to any location in the universe. This is how George and Annie would go
out into space on their "treasure hunt". However, they needed to find a
place where they would not be seen. During the launch, they quietly
crept to the Clean Room, which is kept at extremely high cleanliness,
with less microbes and other particles in the air than normal air does.
This is where astronauts go so that they would be germ-free before going
into space because of the possibility that the germs would be mistaken
for new life forms. George and Annie, along with Emmett, were cleaned
upon entry on an assembly-line-like contraption. After the cleaning
process was finished, they were sent into a completely white room.
Emmett brought Cosmos, their gateway to the universe, with him, and
tried to boot it up. After a long effort to boot up Cosmos, Annie and
George stepped through the portal to Mars. The two had radio connections
with Emmett, in case something goes wrong.
George and Annie
arrived at Mars, carefully stepping on the ground and avoiding detection
by the Mars probe. This was to make sure that the scientists wouldn't
mistake their footprints for signs of new life-forms. They carefully
examined the Mars probe and found a message similar to the one Annie
found out about. This time, it showed a circle with a ring around it
(Saturn) and six moons. They quickly decided that the moon they had to
go to was Titan, Saturn's largest moon. They radioed to Emmett to hurry
up, since a huge dust storm was approaching! A few moments later, they
saw the portal to Titan.
They found themselves on a barren
wasteland with a stream of a liquid substance flowing by. That liquid
substance was water mixed with ammonia. The ammonia makes it freeze at
-148 degrees Fahrenheit, as well as make it smell bad, but since the two
were in space suits, that was less of a concern.
On the other
end of the radio, Emmett was in for a surprise. Eric had come into the
clean room and asked Emmett why he was here. He explained the entire
situation: the messages, Cosmos, etc. He also told him that George and
Annie were on Titan, finding the next clue.
Meanwhile, on Titan,
George and Annie had just found a probe floating in the water-ammonia
river, with the word HUYGENS and the next clue. At first, Annie thought
it was a bomb, but George told her that Huygens was an exploration probe
sent by the main Cassini probe in 2004. On another part of it, there
was a message. This time, they had to go to a planet in what appeared to
be a binary -- or two-star -- system. Eric tried to get Cosmos to work,
but it didn't for a while, and methane rain was falling on Titan, which
can deplete space suits. Fortunately, Eric was able to get the portal
to open to the Alpha Centauri star system. All this time, however,
George's father had gone missing in their eco-mission in the Pacific.
George
and Annie found themselves on a planet where there were TWO "suns", not
one, as Annie soon pointed out: Alpha A and Alpha B. Alpha A was
setting and Alpha B was rising. The two were getting tired when Emmett
radioed them, saying that Eric was on his way there. He managed to get
there safe and then sending them to 55 Cancri, another star system very
far away. They climbed up a rocky outcrop and saw a mysterious shadow.
Then a voice went through all their microphones: "Hello, Eric, we meet
again..."
It turned out to be Dr. Graham Reeper, Eric's
friend-turned-enemy because of an incident with the first ever Cosmos.
It took up almost an entire room! Graham was secretly planning to view
the Big Bang with Cosmos, but Eric came and prevented him from doing it,
since it was so dangerous and would endanger many lives due to the
massive energy, heat, and pressure during the situation. Instead, the
portal opened to the Sun, burning Graham's hands, before Eric told
Cosmos to close the portal. This got Graham suspended from the Global
Space Agency and ever since, he was planning to get revenge on the human
race by using a small liquid vial, but the two kids headbutted him
before he could. Eventually, he and Eric apologized to each other on
what they did to each other, and promised Graham he could come back to
the field of science again. Cosmos opened the portal back to Earth, and
everyone returned.
Later, Emmett's parents came to pick him up,
and George asked Eric if his family could go back to England with them,
and he agreed. Annie and George rejoiced and celebrated that they would
be together again.