Tag: Children’s books

Maybe my use of Sly and the Family Stone’s I Want To Take You Higher was a bit on the nose for a launch song. Whatever. I loved the idea of that churning bass line merging with the vibration of the engines and had to use it. Chills!

Excerpt:
“There was a pause, then the voice said ‘T-minus 10… 9…’
A guitar and bass played a syncopated descending line. A voice yelled Hey! four times on the down beat. The guitar was joined by an organ, both playing a funk counterpoint to the bass as it settled into a churning distorted riff that seemed to shake their seats, though Cas knew that wasn’t the music doing that. A voice sang that it wanted to take them higher while a trumpet played syncopated notes between the words. Their weight suddenly increased, and they knew the Peregrine was rising from its pad as the voice continued to beckon them higher and higher. Cas thought the music might be too loud for Ori, but then she heard her sister yelling Higher! Higher! in the comms.”
— from Food: Generation Mars, Book Four

Image: A closeup of the drive plume as Rocket Lab’s Electron rocket called “PREFIRE and Ice,” lifts off from Launch Complex 1 in Māhia, New Zealand at 3:15 p.m. NZST Wednesday, June 5, 2024.

NASA/Rocket Lab
public domain

Kids love trains. There are no trains on Mars, but kids there love them all the more for this. Cas and Ori are past this stage of childhood, but they remember.

Excerpt:
“Next came a shuffle beat, brass and woodwinds playing a woo-woo sound, and a smooth voice singing a song about a train and a boogie. This one had been a favorite of Ori’s when she was little. The girls bounced in their seats to the walking bass line.”
— from Food: Generation Mars, Book Four

Choo, Choo, Ch’boogie, by Louis Jordan, was a favorite of one of my daughters when she was little. We put it on her child’s MP3 player, and she would play it over and over, singing along. I like the idea of a dad remembering this as he puts together a playlist for his daughters to listen to as they embark on a great and dangerous adventure. I also like the idea of sitting in a rocket waiting for launch, listening to an old-timey song about sitting in a station waiting for a train.

https://open.spotify.com/track/0eRHaqF1lJDIJ0GTy5SGC6?si=d8a77777482648d3