Two earlier novels ("The Art of Stretching" and "A Fickle Wind") detail David's balloon experiments; now, in "Resurgam (Rise Again)" ($8.99 in paperback, independently published; also for Amazon Kindle) David enters Del Rio Vista High School and sets his sights on rockets.
The author and I are about the same age, and old friends (I'm a friend and he's old), and he generously thanks me in the acknowledgements. These books evoke a nostalgic charm, a less frantic time when even one's rival-in-rocketry could lend a hand.
Janzen and his experimenter pal Jack Johnson (fully recovered after a car accident) set out to build a rocket a few feet long, with a nose cone, and to mix their own rocket fuel, all in the name of science. This isn't a fireworks project; it's serious business on the nearby alkali flats complete with spotters and measurements of the flight path.
Not only is there neighborhood competition in rocketry, but rivalry at the upcoming school science fair. As with his balloon experiments, David's rocket launches rarely go off without a hitch but eventually, through some providential meetings with others, David and Jack manage to send something into the skies and into the notebooks for the science fair. Will they beat the others (including a team with attractive Mandy Sandy and her "beatific smile")?
Rocketry has its up and downs (literally), and David faces the deaths of the older town bully, JFK, and his beloved Aunt Martha, who tells him near the end that David must "promise you will not stop being the person God made you be." She teaches him "one Latin word—resurgam. It means I will rise again. On that day, I will rise."
Despite sadness, setbacks, and sputterings, young Janzen's hope burns bright as he faces uncertain years ahead. As do we all.
