My Science School

The Faraway Tree is a series of popular novels for children by British author Enid Blyton. The stories take place in an enchanted wood in which a gigantic magical tree grows – the eponymous 'Faraway Tree'. The tree is so tall that its topmost branches reach into the clouds and it is wide enough to contain small houses carved into its trunk. The wood and the tree are discovered by three children named Jo, Bessie and Fanny (later updated to Joe, Beth and Frannie), who move into a house nearby. They then go on adventures to the top of the tree.

In October 2014 it was announced there would be a big screen adaptation of The Magic Faraway Tree, to be made by Sam Mendes' production company Neal Street Productions. In November 2017, Simon Farnaby, who had previously written the screenplay for Paddington 2, confirmed that he was working on the project, a collaboration between Neal Street Productions and StudioCanal UK.

Picture Credit : Google

A Journey to the Centre of the Earth, French Voyage au centre de la Terre, novel by prolific French author Jules Verne, published in 1864. It is the second book in his popular series Voyages extraordinaires (1863–1910), which contains novels that combine scientific facts with adventure fiction and laid the groundwork for science fiction.

The film also introduced the 4DX movie format, featuring "4D" motion effects in a specially designed cinema in Seoul, South Korea, using tilting seats to convey motion, wind, sprays of water and sharp air, probe lights to mimic lightning, fog, scents, and other theatrical special effects.

The film received mixed reviews from critics and earned $244.2 million against a $60 million budget.

An understanding of the time in which Verne was writing sheds light on the story line. Theories that the Earth was hollow were bandied about in Europe in the 19th century, and there was also public interest in the growing sciences of geology, paleontology, and evolution at the time. A Journey to the Centre of the Earth was enormously popular, and numerous, mostly bad, English translations appeared quickly. The most notable among the several film and television adaptations was Henry Levin’s Journey to the Center of the Earth (1959).

Picture Credit : Google

Eoin Colfer is the author of the internationally bestselling Artemis Fowl, which was named the public’s favourite Puffin Classic of all time. The Artemis Fowl series has sold in excess of 25 million copies and translated into 40 languages.

Since then, Artemis Fowl, which was named the public’s favourite Puffin Modern Classic of all time, has sold in excess of 25 million copies and has been translated into 40 languages. There are eight books in the series, alongside numerous companion books, limited edition releases, audiobooks and digital releases. In 2019, a brand new spin-off series called The Fowl Twins was released by Disney Books (US) and HaprerCollins (UK). This new trilogy features Artemis Fowl’s younger brothers Myles and Beckett Fowl and follows their own exciting adventures as they outsmart their opponents, make contact with the Fairy world and get themselves into all sorts of trouble. An Artemis Fowl Movie has been adapted by Walt Disney Studios and was released on Disney+ in May 2020 due cinema closures globally during the coronavirus pandemic. It was directed by Sir Kenneth Branagh and stars Ferdia Shaw (Artemis Fowl), Lara McDonnell (Holly Short), Josh Gad (Mulch Diggums), Nonso Anozie (Domovoi Butler), Dame Judy Dench (Commander Root), Colin Farrell (Artemis Fowl Sr.) and more.

Other book titles include The Wish List, The Supernaturalist and the Legends series for younger readers. Eoin’s books have won numerous awards including The British Children’s Book of the Year, The Irish Book Awards Children’s Book of the Year and The German Children’s Book of the Year. The BBC made a hit series based on his book Half Moon Investigations.

Picture Credit : Google

Sir Terence David John Pratchett, OBE was a British fantasy, Science fiction, and children's author. He was best known for his popular and long-running Discworld series of comic fantasy novels. Pratchett's first novel, The Carpet People, was published in 1971, and since his first Discworld novel (The Colour of Magic) was published in 1983, he has written two books a year on average. Pratchett was also known for close collaboration on adaptations of his books, and now has three of his books made into films.

Before he became a full-time writer, Pratchett had already had a thorough grounding in unbelievable and ridiculous situations. He was a press officer for a nuclear power station during the days of the Cold War, Chernobyl and the time the Hartlepool Power Station visitor centre was open every day apart from Christmas Day.

It was an experience that taught him the virtues of scepticism, which shines through in his writing. He said: “Eight years involved with the nuclear industry have taught me that when nothing can possibly go wrong and every avenue has been covered, then is the time to buy a house on the next continent.”

Every genre novelist needs his stock ‘end of the world’ scenario, and for Pratchett this was the Dungeon Dimensions. These parallel universes, filled with creatures that would give H.R. Geiger a headache, exist beyond the edge of reality. However, as a world forever on the cusp of unreality itself, the Discworld is always one major magical event away from the Dungeon Dimensions breaking through and wreaking havoc.

No early Discworld book is spared the threat of an invasion of these monsters, which can feel a little wearing if you’re binge reading the series. Thankfully though, Pratchett learned to vary his peril as the series went on. If you’re keen to see a Dungeon Dimension breakthrough especially well-handled though, consider his spoof of the movie business, Moving Pictures.

Picture Credit : Google

The Merchant of Venice, comedy in five acts by William Shakespeare, written about 1596–97 and printed in a quarto edition in 1600 from an authorial manuscript or copy of one.

The date of composition of The Merchant of Venice is believed to be between 1596 and 1598. The play was mentioned by Francis Meres in 1598, so it must have been familiar on the stage by that date. The title page of the first edition in 1600 states that it had been performed "divers times" by that date. Salerino's reference to his ship the Andrew is thought to be an allusion to the Spanish ship St. Andrew, captured by the English at Cádiz in 1596. A date of 1596–97 is considered consistent with the play's style.

The play was entered in the Register of the Stationers Company, the method at that time of obtaining copyright for a new play, by James Roberts on 22 July 1598 under the title "the Marchaunt of Venyce or otherwise called the Jewe of Venyce." On 28 October 1600 Roberts transferred his right to the play to the stationer Thomas Heyes; Heyes published the first quarto before the end of the year. It was printed again in 1619, as part of William Jaggard's so-called False Folio. (Later, Thomas Heyes' son and heir Laurence Heyes asked for and was granted a confirmation of his right to the play, on 8 July 1619.) The 1600 edition is generally regarded as being accurate and reliable. It is the basis of the text published in the 1623 First Folio, which adds a number of stage directions, mainly musical cues.

Picture Credit : Google

The Autobiography of a Horse, the only novel by Anna Sewell and the first major animal story in children’s literature. The author wrote it “to induce kindness, sympathy, and an understanding treatment of horses”; it was published in 1877, shortly before Sewell’s death.

Black Beauty, a handsome well-born, well-bred horse of the era before automobiles, narrates the story. He is initially owned by kind masters but is sold to successively crueler owners. Eventually he collapses from overwork and ill treatment, but in the end he is sold to another kind owner and recovers. Beauty is an ideal horse—obedient, willing, intelligent, and courageous. Sewell’s careful observation and extensive descriptions of equine behaviour lend verisimilitude to the novel.

Sewell's decision to write the book as an "animal autobiography" was quite novel in Victorian England, and the little green book with the sad-looking horse on the cover was released to great fanfare. Promoters in the U.S. brought a pirated edition of the book to America hoping it would do for animal rights what Uncle Tom's Cabin had done for slavery. Within two years, 1 million copies of Black Beauty were in circulation in the U.S., and animal rights activists regularly passed copies of the book to horse drivers and stable hands.

Picture Credit : Google