Don’t we all wish we could travel to simpler times, or foretell the future by experiencing it first-hand?
Time travel. Such a powerful concept. A beautiful wish. An elusive dream. Especially after reading a few horrendous headlines or spending another hour with someone who had to google at least three times in order to have a simple conversation.
So many books have been written on this topic, including 11/22/63 by Stephen King, The Time Machine by HG Wells, The Time Traveler’s Wife, Slaughterhouse-Five by Kurt Vonnegut and, of course, The Shining Girls by Lauren Beukes.
Nigerian writer Suleiman Agbonkhianmen Buhari has also flirted with the idea, writing a short story titled “Discovering Time Travel” which was published on the pan-African writers’ collective, Jalada.
Buhari is a full-time writer who lives in Nigeria and divides his time between Lagos and Benin. He attended the 2013 Farafina Writers Workshop and has been shortlisted for many prose and poetry awards, including the 2012 Creative Alliance Short Story Prize.
Read his story as today’s Fiction Friday offering:
A brightly lit, white walled room.
Two men are sitting, facing each other across a legless table.
One man is dressed in a white coverall, the other is wearing a black uniform.
One man has a story to tell, the other is eager to listen.
The blue chairs they are sitting on also have no legs.
Everything in the room defies gravity.
The story the man in white is about to tell defies logic.
“Please state your name and official designation for the record.”
“Dr. Kehinde Obaseki. GND57903. Research Scientist, Gondwanan Institute of Light.”
“Former Research Scientist, you mean.”
“Yes, of course … former.”
“Okay Doc’, tell me the truth. Where is the inertium? We both know you took it. We …”
“I have never denied that.”
“Okay then, where is it?”
“It’s lost in time.”
Book details
- 11/22/63 by Stephen King
Book homepage
EAN: 9781451627282
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- The Time Machine by HG Wells
EAN: 9780451470706
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- The Time Traveler’s Wife by Audrey Niffenegger
EAN: 9781476764832
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- Slaughterhouse-Five by Kurt Vonnegut
EAN: 9780385333849
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- The Shining Girls by Lauren Beukes
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EAN: 9781415202012
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Gif courtesy of GIPHY