Book excerpt: Moments in Time, a novel about time and that which is timeless and that which is not, tells the story of Benjamin Woodward, an engineer, an icon of the modern world, who, believing that he creates order out of disorder, and that, the risks can be managed, discovers, to his cost, that neither is true. Accidentally discovering a portal that leads from the early 21st century to 1750, he finds himself in a Britain on the cusp of the industrial revolution, and the dawning of the age of the industrial engineer. With growing but misplaced confidence, he sets about living life in two ages separated by over 250 years, but he encounters a mysterious voice that persistently warns him about the folly of his actions, but which he constantly ignores; as he does also the self-evident unexpected consequences of his actions. Gradually however, the universe begins to teach Benjamin important lessons, which allows him in the end, after he has destroyed everything that he values in both eras, to understand that he should have taken note of what the voice was telling him. And upon reaching the edge of doom, Benjamin realises what he needs to do to save himself, from himself. Moments in Time is a tale that comments upon the damaging values and beliefs of scientists, engineers and technologists, who, with their collective delusions, Darwinist perspectives, fragmented minds, vested interests, and their reductionist and mechanistic world-view, bear a significant responsibility for creating the madness of the modern world; insanities that threaten to condemn future generations to a bleak existence. The clear significance of the book is that it shows that it is possible to walk a different path if people are prepared to think and behave differently; a very timely message indeed.