This is StoryQuest. Today's story is...

The Clock Stopper.

Tia was sitting in her class when one day, quite suddenly, everything froze around her.

Somehow, for some reason, time had stood still. But why?

Tia lived in Birmingham 100 years ago, when it was a dark and noisy place full of factories and

smoke. Men and machinery turned out hairpins and guns, bright buttons and glass. Tia was not exactly an orphan, but lived

with her aunt, who ignored her so much that Tia felt very alone. She passed the days reading

books from the library. Tia had been to the library so many times that she knew almost every

book on every shelf. She knew exactly where her favorite stories could be found, and where

giant atlases were

kept, full of maps describing the earth and strange foreign lands and the farthest parts of the

kingdom from the Scottish tribes to the Cornish coasts. On this occasion, we find Tia in the library

early one morning. There was usually enough time for a quick visit before she went to school,

and she was frequently the only person there, as she preferred. She was thumbing through

a brown book entitled Jungle Paths and Inca Ruins. Written by a famous explorer, she was

immersed in the report of a tribe he had come across in the Amazon jungle,

who liked to eat fried ants, which were said to taste of the finest bacon. Can you imagine?

Teia screwed up her face at the thought of something so horrid, but somehow couldn't help

but peep at the pages to see what other gruesome treats they enjoyed. Her eyes were

suddenly caught as a completely different book fell from the shelves and landed at her feet. The book

was called Travels with Time. Cloth covered and thick, it appeared to be very old. She turned it over

in her hands and a shiver ran down her spine.

...