Physics Fables [PDF + eBook]

Five illustrated fantasy stories, each one built around a real piece of physics — 116 pages, for readers ages 8–10. EPUB and PDF.

Read a Sample

A tortoise named Eloise races a literal photon and discovers that light breaks the rules of relative velocity. A girl named Sakura investigates why her village's oily sea has stopped giving up its eels, and ends up talking to a mermaid about density and buoyancy. A small bee named Clemmm — the end of her name sounds like humming — invents a coordinate system so she can tell the hive where the flower meadow is. A butterfly named Arnold attends what may be the last great Conclave of all animals, seeing in ultraviolet and polarized light what none of the others can. And a lone adventurer named Zara carries a magnetized scepter across dragon-filled lands on a planet where gravity is gentler than ours.

Each story is self-contained, and each one takes a piece of real physics and connects it to everyday life.

Written by Sarah Allen, with each story illustrated by a different artist — Vladimir Djekic, Donna Schafer, Nathan Ranieri Moncao and Marie Delwart. Suitable for ages 8–10, though younger readers who love stories will find plenty to enjoy alongside a grown-up.

What's inside the book

• Five complete stories, 116 pages, in color
• Fifteen Science Notes — short explanations set where the story raises the question: relative velocity and the speed of light, density and buoyancy, animal color vision and polarized light, magnetism and how magnets generate electricity. (Clemmm's story handles its math differently — the polar coordinates are explained inside the narration rather than in sidebars.)
• A Science Activity at the end of every story, using ordinary things:
  • A three-person relative velocity experiment — one walker, one faster walker, and what each of them sees
  • Density in a cup, with gravel and sand and a kitchen scale
  • A message-in-a-bottle challenge, floating a sealed container between a layer of oil and a layer of water
  • A full polar coordinates activity with a materials list and instructions — a protractor, sticky notes, a tape measure, and a pinecone standing in for a beehive
  • Soap bubbles in sunlight, to see the colors a thin film makes
  • A magnet experiment: spin one, and watch what the other one does
• An "About this Book" introduction explaining how to read the collection — stories first, notes when you're curious, activities whenever you like

What you'll get

• An EPUB — for Kindle, Apple Books, Kobo or any e-reader
• A PDF — for any device, or for printing at home

Both are ready the moment you check out — the download buttons are on the confirmation page. Your order confirmation email also has a View Order and Downloads button, which takes you back to your order page to download them any time.

Looking for the paperback? Physics Fables is also sold as a printed book, which comes with these same two files. This page is the digital edition on its own.

Part of the Fairy Tale Physics series

Every book in the series is self-contained and they can be read in any order. Physics Fables is the short-story collection, which makes it a natural way in for a reader who wants to sample the series, or who would rather have variety than one long narrative. Characters and creatures from across the series make quiet appearances — keep an eye out.

About the author

Sarah Allen tutored math and physics for twenty years before becoming a full-time writer. She has a physics degree from the University of Washington (graduated with college and departmental honors) and a master's in Cognition and Learning from Columbia. Her goal is to write the sort of physics books she would have wanted as a kid.

Ages 8–10 · Five stories · 116 pages · Color illustrations · EPUB and PDF