Ellie doesn’t believe in magic, she believes in science.
But science is magic!
Science explains everything, right? But when Ellie’s school burns down in roaring purple flames (wait, what?), her favourite teacher hands her wrist bracers that summon the elements (Bracers... Nitrogen!), and she’s invited to join a secret society of the smartest minds on Earth (yikes!), suddenly not everything
has an explanation after all!
Driven by logic, unshakeable stubbornness, and an unreasonable number of jam jars, Ellie is determined to prove that science can explain everything — no matter how strange things get. But can she?
Ellie Ment and the Material Matter is a STEM-based adventure where chemistry meets chaos, physics bends reality, and curiosity might just save the world.
Ellie doesn’t believe in magic, she believes in science.
But science is magic!
Science explains everything, right? But when Ellie’s school burns down in roaring purple flames (wait, what?), her favourite teacher hands her wrist bracers that summon the elements (Bracers... Nitrogen!), and she’s invited to join a secret society of the smartest minds on Earth (yikes!), suddenly not everything
has an explanation after all!
Driven by logic, unshakeable stubbornness, and an unreasonable number of jam jars, Ellie is determined to prove that science can explain everything — no matter how strange things get. But can she?
Ellie Ment and the Material Matter is a STEM-based adventure where chemistry meets chaos, physics bends reality, and curiosity might just save the world.
Everything that happens in our world has an explanation. Yet not everything can always be explained right here, right now.
And that, for the most part, is perfectly okay.
The beauty lies in the fact that even the strangest peculiarities will be explained eventually.
But if you ever find yourself in the pitch black early hours of the morning, alone in the middle of a forest, with torrential rain hammering your already drenched raincoat, watching your newly built school burning to the ground and the only way to help would be by using the ten jam jars stuffed into your backpack...well, at that point you might start to wonder if this particular oddity would ever be explained at all. And if the flames coming from your school weren’t the usual red and orange but instead a roaring purple – yes, purple! - you may think it would remain a mystery forever.
At least, that’s precisely what Ellie Ment was thinking when precisely all of that was happening to her…
When these things happen, it’s probably best to take a deep breath and remind yourself of all the strange things that can be explained in this world.
Take the town of Hapsie, for example. Local litterer Lucas would always deliberately drop litter wherever he went. He loved it. Even though his mum told him it was wrong. But one day, he suddenly stopped doing it. It was hard to explain.
However, when it was later discovered that Lucas was hoarding this litter to build his own castle made entirely out of rubbish, everything was once again clear. It was a simple explanation that wasn’t immediately available when the event originally occurred.
(A quick side note: The castle eventually fell over with Lucas inside, and he subsequently decided that littering Leafy Park meant fewer food containers smacking him in the head, so began littering again. Sigh.)
Of course there are larger examples, more hygienic ones too.
In this small historic market town of Hapsie, the weather was a constant matter of discussion – as was the case all over England. Hapsie looked quite delightful in the rain, surrounded by lush green hills and with traditional stone houses still standing in its town centre. But why the constant, never-stopping, rain? Well, now there’s something the locals of Hapsie (Hapsians) had tried to explain for thousands of years.
When the Romans settled in Hapsie over 2,000 years ago, their explanation was that the rain came from their king of the gods, Jupiter. If they needed more rain to grow their crops, they’d pray to Jupiter. If they needed less rain because clearly their earlier prayers had been far too effective, well, they’d do another quick prayer. Jupiter seemed to listen to the prayers for more rain a lot more than the prayers for less rain. And with that they had their explanation: Jupiter was a very annoying god.
Then came the Saxons. They lived in Hapsie about 1,000 years ago and their first settlers believed rain was controlled by Thunor (AKA Thor), their thunder god. Like the Romans, the Saxons would perform rituals to start and stop the rain. Like Jupiter, Thunor was also annoying – he was a lot more interested in starting the rain than stopping it. When you’re the god of thunder, no rain means no thunder and that means nothing to do. Again, an explanation.
Today in Hapsie, the explanation was all about the water cycle: rivers evaporate, clouds form, rain pours down on Lucas’ trash castle, it collapses, and he returns to littering once more. See, two explanations in one there – nice! Today, the science of the rain is considered a more reliable explanation than an annoying god.
But just because people have agreed on an explanation, it doesn’t mean it’s correct. The Romans, the Saxons and the Hapsians of today would each insist their explanation was right. But who’s to say that, in 1,000 years, future Hapsians won’t have a completely different idea as to why it rains? The general rule is that if it makes sense at the time, that’s probably good enough.
But what was Ellie doing outside in the forest near Hapsie School at two in the morning in the first place?
She’d snuck out of her house while everyone else was far too busy snoring to give a hoot (pun intended) about her nighttime whereabouts.
Why had she left her warm, dry and comfy bed and cuddly gorilla toy, Attenborough? Well, that’s simple to answer when you know more about Ellie.
You see, Ellie was a scientist. An eleven-year-old, self-proclaimed scientist, but a scientist nonetheless. Ellie loved science, because with science, everything had an explanation, and for Ellie, that was incredibly important. She had no time for magic, for example. Eurghhh, magic, Ellie would often think to herself as she picked up a book about dragons and wands. You see, to Ellie, magic is cheating. “If you can wave a wand to make a feather float, but you can’t explain how that feather is floating, then what’s the point in reading about it at all?” she’d often proclaim.
Ellie would much rather it was explained using science. “Oskar, wearing his favourite red woolly jumper, grabbed his big green balloon and a small feather and rubbed them both vigorously up and down against his chest for thirty seconds. This built up static electricity as electrons jumped from the jumper onto both the balloon and the feather. Oskar placed the feather a few centimetres above the balloon and – SWOOSH! – it floated!” Nice! That’s because the rubbing gave the feather and the balloon the same electrical charge, so they pushed away from each other.
Okay, Ellie’s version was a little bit lengthier than wand-waving, sure. And probably wouldn’t sell a million copies if written in a book. But it was certainly more interesting. To Ellie, at least. And best of all, as she was wearing her own woolly jumper under her green raincoat right then, she could perform Oskar’s ‘magic’ trick too! Ellie loved that about science – anyone, from anywhere, could do it if they wanted to. All you needed was a balloon, a sweater and a small feather.
Go on, you try it too.
Well, maybe just get to the end of this chapter first.
(That said, if you happen to live in Hapsie, the humidity and water vapour in the air might make it difficult. Why? Because static electricity hates moisture, would you believe?)
In short, to Ellie, magic wasn’t very useful.
Magic isn’t science.
But science is magic.
And more importantly, Ellie can do science.
Ellie loved science. She proudly displayed a poster of the periodic table on her bedroom wall. It was no ordinary poster either, neatly embellished with her own notes and thoughts. Ellie could recite the entire periodic table by heart, including names, symbols, and atomic numbers. It was an impressive skill and as you’ll see, it would come in handy later in her journey.
But let’s not get ahead of ourselves.
Rest assured you don’t need to be an expert on it either.
But that was what Ellie was doing in the woods at 2am on a school night: science.
She scurried down the back garden path, huddled over, heading for Hapsie Forest in the pouring rain, backpack full to the brim with jam jars – endless, endless, empty jam jars.
(By the way, if you happen to be reading this story as a resident of Hapsie, and you’ve been busy recycling your jam jars over the last year, I’m afraid they never reached the local processing centre. Nope. They were scavenged out of your bin by Ellie. Special mention to the people of 104 Thorn Lane: your endless love for hazelnut spread was a welcome assistance for Ellie’s progress. Keep it up!)
The hypothesis was simple, really: everything needs water to grow. But does rainwater at different times of the year and from different environments change how a plant will grow? What if a plant only received water from one specific time of year?
In January, when it rained, the air was full of atmospheric gases from Hapsie’s wood fires and coal burners. The water droplets might have absorbed these gases before they hit the ground.
In June, the rain from the summer showers fell through different minerals and nutrients – like pollen or dust in the air – and might have picked them up along the way.
In October, the rain might have landed on microbes from decomposing leaves and organic matter, meaning the rainwater interacted with the soil in different ways.
And as it was October – October 1st – Ellie needed a place with lots of leaves. You’d be forgiven for thinking Leafy Park would be the obvious choice to head to, but while leaves did fall from the sycamore, beech and horse chestnut trees, the Hapsie town council were so efficient in sweeping up these leaves that Leafy Park was, for the most part, leaf-free. Also, it closed at 4pm in the autumn and winter. Everyone in Hapsie found that really annoying – almost as annoying as Jupiter and Thunor.
So that’s why Ellie found herself under the tall canopies of the oak trees of Hapsie Forest – there were plenty of leaves on the floor there. Had it not been pitch black with the only light coming from Ellie’s faulty headtorch, she would have been able to see a sea of golden, red and yellow leaves. As it was – and gosh she must get that headtorch fixed – Ellie could only really see a flickery faint outline of leafy matter as she stumbled over the forest floor.
Ellie’s first task was to use her shovel to dig ten holes, each large enough to fit a jam jar, in various spots around the forest. Digging was much easier in October when the ground was wet; far, far easier than in January, when it was frozen, or June, when the soil was rock-hard dry.
Next, she marked down in her notebook where all the holes were. It was significantly harder to jot notes in your notebook in October when it was raining; far, far harder than on a June summer night, or in January when it’s frosty out.
Ellie was determined, however, and began pacing out steps away from a handful of odd-looking trees. Ellie had tried a tape measure rather than steps but it turned out not to be so practical on your own, in the rain, generally in the dark.
“Thirty-four steps from Space Rocket Tree towards Big Ears Tree, away from Large Lump Tree.” Ellie spoke out loud as she scribbled down her notes.
Once the locations of the ten jars had been noted, Ellie returned to each hole and buried the jam jars up to their lips, leaving their tops flush with the ground and without lids.
Finally, Ellie needed to cover the jars. Jam jars were fantastic for collecting rainwater, but also brilliant at capturing small insects too. Invertebrates were not part of this experiment and there was no need to sacrifice a living creature by allowing it to fall into a jam jar of certain doom.
Luckily, at the end of last year, Edward McMan of 72 Grumpot Avenue had decided that linen – and only linen – would be his ‘thing’ for the new year. Linen trousers, linen t-shirts, linen socks – even linen underpants. Edward was quick to purchase an entirely new, pure, natural linen wardrobe.
Even more luckily for Ellie, by the second week of January, Edward had decided that linen wasn’t his ‘thing’ after all. The entire, largely unworn wardrobe found itself on the pavement, awaiting collection by the ever-efficient Hapsie Town Council. The even more efficient Ellie Ment, however, had other ideas. Natural linen, she realised, provided the perfect solution to a bug-free life.
But she left the underpants for the Town Council.
After giving the expensive linen clothes a full wash without detergent, Ellie cut them into circles, ready to place over her open jam jars and secure with string. The fine weave of the organic linen allowed the rainwater – with its dissolved minerals, gases, and other microscopic components – to pass through effectively, while preventing animal mishaps and, importantly, avoiding any future contamination of the water collected in the jars. A practical and scientifically sound choice for Ellie’s experiment. Environmentally sound too.
With the October jars safely buried, Ellie set off to retrieve the (hopefully) overflowing September jars.
When she’d buried them on September 1st, she knew if she didn’t get her burials completed that night her experiment wouldn’t be quantifiably accurate. She needed all jars to be buried at the start of every month and stay there for the whole month of collection, otherwise, “What sort of scientist am I?”
Preparation for the start of a new school year had simply got in the way.Not only was Ellie switching schools, but the school itself was completely new too! A whole new development! Brand new!
It was certainly needed, ever since Head Boy Grant Fry had a wooden beam from the cafeteria roof fall just thirty centimetres in front of his nose. That near death experience for Grant meant the school was grant-ed a revamp. (Sorry, Grant.)
The facts do vary a little depending on who you ask: the official school incident report suggests that Grant had been outside the cafeteria at the time – actually he’d have been at home, probably asleep – as the beam most likely fell sometime between 7.30pm after the cleaners left and 7am the following morning. Grant most probably discovered it on the floor when he arrived early for jazz band practice. But, you know, it had been ten years since then…school kids, rumours, excitement…the near death story was far more interesting.
The school itself had been fundraising for double that amount of time. Building a new school is expensive, and even after both local and national government got involved with funding, it took the sale of a considerable number of cakes, bakes, cookies and jam-swirls to fund a new science block, let alone the rest of the school. I’m not sure how anyone in Hapsie ate that much cake, but somehow the teachers got the school approved. They insisted it was built with brand new, state-of-the-art materials to make sure it was fit for future environmental challenges. It may have taken years to fund the development, but over the summer holidays the school had been knocked down and rebuilt in record time. Brilliant!
But the most impressive thing about Hapsie School was the teachers. Well-regarded as some of the brightest minds around, the teachers of Hapsie School were leaps and bounds above any neighbouring school, or in the whole county for that matter. Ellie felt very lucky to be in the catchment area.
Having trudged through the miserably wet forest, Ellie stood on the edge of the equally drenched road and a large pothole shaped like a Stegosaurus. The Hapsians called it the ‘stego-hole’. Stego-hole? Stego-bowl more like, as it was filed to the brim with rainwater and…plastic. Food-containers, yoghurt pots, packaging…
Oh, Lucas! Ellie thought.
From Stego-hole Ellie had buried the ten jam jars along the side of the road, each fifty paces apart. If she had pulled out her notes, they would have been very repetitive:
#1: Opposite side of the road to Stego-hole
#2: 50 paces towards school along the road
#3: 50 more paces
#4: 50 more paces
#5: 50 more paces
…and so on.
As Ellie walked away having collected the seventh jar, having labelled it like the others with an indelible pen, “September”, taken off the linen cover, placed it into a plastic bag for safekeeping, and finally screwed tight the proper metal lid for the jam jar…she was three hundred paces away from Stego-hole, three hundred paces closer to the school, three hundred paces around the bend of the bumpy lane.
The light was different. For some reason she could see a little more easily. She looked up, to see her brand new school.
Her brand new school, which was now ablaze.
For some reason Ellie’s first reaction was to adjust her headtorch. It didn’t help in any way. Her torch was too small to have any effect against the light from the flames, even if it wasn’t half broken.
There was absolutely nothing Ellie could do. She didn’t have a phone (her parents said she had to be fifteen to have a phone – erugh!). She was a good forty-five minutes’ walk from home, and shouting out at 2am wasn’t going to attract much attention – at least no more attention than an entire school on fire.
So Ellie just stood there, watching.
Watching as her classrooms collapsed in front of her. Watching her dreams of science experiments, records, adventure turn to smoke and fizz up into the rain. Watching the roaring purple flames rip through the ceilings of the new cafeteria.
Wait…Purple flames? That’s weird, right?
She felt cold now; her rain jacket had given up at least twenty minutes ago, but it hadn’t mattered. And then—
“You, there!” grunted a voice.
“Huh?” is all that Ellie could muster as she swung around to see…Master Quinn, the art professor.
Neither of them said anything. As Master Quinn stood watching the school burning down with Ellie, she could see the colour fading from his face. I guess the knowledge that your prized artworks are burning down too will do that. Aside from the roar in the distance the only sound between the two was the chomp from Master Quinn as he munched through a bag of nuts.
Ellie wasn’t sure if under her raincoat and drenched to the bone, Master Quinn had recognised her. Given her particularly pathetic performance in art over the first weeks of the term, it was probably better if he hadn’t.
“Go home, Ellie,” came Quinn.
Oh. So he had recognised her.
“Can you call the fire brigade? I don’t have a phone,”
Ellie admitted.
“Nope.” And then after a short, confused moment, Master Quinn added, “Me neither.”
“How could this have happened?” Ellie wondered aloud.
“It’s almost Halloween. Blasted tricksters! It’s whizzle-whumping kids.”
With that, Master Quinn limped off into the distance, chucking the rest of the bag of nuts down his throat as he left. “Go home, Ellie!” he shouted. “I’ll make sure this is taken care of.”
Everything in our world has an explanation for how it happens. Yet not everything can always be explained right here, right now.
When the explanation provided made Ellie’s face screw up so tight her nose might pop off, well, that was not okay.
“It’s not nearly Halloween at all!” she called back. Halloween was almost a month away.
Why wasn’t Master Quinn more panicked?
As Ellie remained frozen to the spot, embers still soaring into the sky, her eyes began to adjust to see the silhouettes of other adults walking around the perimeter of the school.
Who are they?
Why aren’t they alerting the fire-brigade?
And:
What on earth is a ‘whizzle-whumping’ kid?
There was no way kids could have done something this big.
Ellie always trusted her numbers and Master Quinn’s explanation just didn’t add up. The thing about explanations, they may exist, but that doesn’t mean they are always correct.
Ellie could tell this one certainly wasn’t.
Could Master Quinn be responsible for the school burning down? Was he working with these mysterious other adults? Was that the explanation? How would an eleven-year-old, self-proclaimed scientist find out the answer?
Ellie Ment loves science. Eschewing fairy tales and stories of magic, Ellie can always be found thinking deeply about the world around her and implementing new experiments. When Ellie is approached by her favorite teacher, a new world of scientific possibilities opens up to her as she enters the domain of the mysterious Material Matter. But things are not always as they seem, and it will be up to Ellie to discover the truth - and find her own path to saving the planet.
"Ellie Ment and the Material Matter" by Bertie Stephens is the highly engaging tale of an eleven year old science prodigy and her quest to save the world. I loved the narrative style, as the author regularly addresses the audience while the story unfolds. Ellie perfectly embodies the children of the STEM generation as she regularly engages in scientific observation and experimentation that would often be considered far beyond her years. I understood Ellie's thought processes and quantification well, though there were definitely times where her reasoning was light-years ahead of my own. Ellie's best friend Michael both compliments and contrasts her character, as a kid highly interested in art and music versus math and chemistry. The differences between their worldviews can cause friction, but also help them find solutions they would not have arrived at on their own, and this multifaceted friendship was a joy to read about.
The supporting cast is rich and varied, and I loved finally reading a book by a British author that has a realistic American character with no irritating stereotypes! I also loved that there is a person of faith that does not clash with the other scientifically minded characters, instead lending a beautiful perspective that bridges differing worldviews. The plot is highly nuanced, bringing complex ethical questions to the forefront as the story develops. Do the ends justify the means, and is true altruism a practical possibility? Ellie must confront these not so easy dilemmas as she formulates her own plans, paving her own path as the tale winds to a close.
There are a few loose ends, such as the fate of the injured Kit and the eventual consequences of the ballet lie that remain unaddressed. Additionally, though the science is largely very sound, some portions, particularly the section on "time travel", blur the line between fantasy and science. I also wish there had been a bit more focus on how to protect the environment at a personal level. That said, this is still an engaging tale with a powerful message of enacting change while keeping your moral compass firmly intact.
A brilliant beginning to a series that promises many more adventures, Ellie's quest to protect the planet earns five out of five stars for storytelling excellence. There is mention of fire, blood, injuries, and fantasy violence, making this tale suitable for ages ten and up. A tale of practical science, nuanced morals, and the power of personal choice, this exciting narrative is a perfect pick for all who love intrepid heroes and tales of saving the environment.