Showing results by author "William Grovère" in All Categories

La Charlière is a sequel to The Timecharger, published in 2019. The story takes place in 2084, 20 years after the discoveries by Cédric Rothschild, based on his theory of variable light speed, which had led to the invention of microfusion reactors and timecharging, enabling a host of new transportation technologies. La Charlière is a prototype dirigible designed to operate with lighter-than-air spheres based on timecharging technology.

The story is about a recently retired corporate executive named Christophe Conally who inadvertently stumbles into a conspiracy to counterfeit and smuggle gold bullion by a sinister group called The Syndicate, who are intent on commandeering the global economy and seeking to fill the power vacuum left behind when central governments became irrelevant in the post-modern age. The story describes extremely complex construction projects; physicists, scientists, and engineers; farmers and vintners; diabolical international agents; pets and other friendly creatures.

In the 2060s, a scientist at a French laboratory, named Cédric Rothschild, discovers how to fabricate miniature black holes by assembling neutrons into clusters. The discovery transforms maritime technology, most notably, by cruise ships. An unanticipated consequence of the technology surfaces, however, when it is discovered that neutrons assembled in certain ways also had the property of modifying time locally by a process called time-charging, with the potential to destabilize the global balance of power in a way not experienced since the nuclear arms race.