Send Simon Savage by Stephen Measday

Little Hare Publishing, 2010. ISBN 9781921541339.
(Ages 10+) When Simon returns home to find his mother in tears and police all around the house, the worst he could imagine has happened, his father has disappeared, presumed drowned. But 2 sunglassed men turn up and ask strange questions and do a quick search of his study, then leave without a murmur. What is going on? Simon is then given the opportunity to go to a prestigious school in Britain while his family will be well looked after, and as they are almost destitute, they accept the offer. But once a the school, Simon is let into a few secrets, the biggest one being that he is destined to be a time traveler, and that his father was instrumental in working out the details of this fabulous discovery.
At the Time Bureau, Simon meets a number of other young people, all chosen for their skills and their DNA structure which shows that they would not be affected by the transmission of their bodies as others would be. They are trained in every aspect of the hazardous journeys they will undertake, and so are sent back and forth to various places in time. Simon's partner in all this is the very odd Danice, who he later finds is from a different time altogether. But at the same time Danice's brother is a time traveler from the future back to where he can steal gold for the leader. All the while, Simon has a hidden agenda, to find out what really happened to his father.
A past master at science fiction stories, Measday has written another book which uses scientific terminology to a sophisticated degree, making the reader almost believe in what he is saying and what the children are doing. So well written that the story seems quite credible, the belief in what is happening is never stretched, and the story grabs the reader with unbounded ease.
Fran Knight