The first installment in Sufiya Ahmed's new time-slip series, Time Travellers: Adventure Calling, skillfully blends education and entertainment. The story begins with a school trip to the Houses of Parliament, following Mia, Ayaan, and Suhana, whose designs were selected in their local MP’s Christmas card competition. This premise sets the stage for a valuable civics lesson, effectively presented through the children's eyes. Despite their prejudiced headteacher, Mr. Hayes, the children enjoy their visit, learning about the history and significance of Westminster.

The narrative takes a dramatic turn when Suhana’s phone transports the trio back to 1911, landing them amidst the Coronation Procession of the Women’s Social and Political Union. As they navigate the bustling streets and face unforeseen challenges, the children form a strong bond and encounter key figures from the suffragette and suffragist movements. Suhana's delight in discovering South Asian women participating in the demonstration highlights the importance of recognizing diverse historical contributions, underscoring the necessity of questioning historical records to uncover hidden stories.

Ahmed juxtaposes the historical struggle for women's suffrage with contemporary movements like Fridays for Future, emphasizing the enduring relevance of standing up for one’s beliefs. This theme is reinforced by Mia and Ayaan’s solidarity with Suhana against Mr. Hayes' unfairness, demonstrating the impact of collective action.

The book concludes with informative details on the women’s suffrage movement and biographies of Lolita Roy and Princess Sophia Duleep Singh, providing readers with additional historical context. Its engaging storytelling encourages young readers to critically examine history and learn it.

Time Travellers: Adventure Calling is an exciting, quick adventure into the past that introduces us to Suhana, a young girl who, while on a school trip to the Houses of Parliament, ends up being transported to the past and learning about the role of Indian women in the Women’s Suffrage movement.

As a young girl who is the victim of bullying by her school headmaster, Suhana finds herself alone and in need of friends. Having won a competition to design a Christmas card for her local MP, she and some classmates end up travelling to London to see the houses of Parlaiment.

While there, Suhana and the other two children from her school end up being thrust back in time where they learn some important historical events and have to get back to where they started before they end up trapped.

The plot is straightforward but includes excitement along the way as the children have to work together, learning about each other as they go. They also have to negotiate a strange and unfamiliar London where Suhana and Ayaan do not expect to find people like themselves.

The story will interest children in the ages 8-11 age bracket while remaining accessible for less confident readers. It cleverly uses the premise of time travel to open up the past and introduce is to some very real, but lesser known historical figures, helping us realise the role that people from different ethnic and cultural backgrounds had in the shaping of our world. The idea is reminiscent of stories such as ‘The Lion Above the Door’ by Onjali Q Rauf, with the added science fiction element which helps the reader enter the action for themselves.

I really enjoyed this time travelling adventure and quickly read it in one sitting. I felt the main characters were really realistic and that children would be able to identify with them. I loved the setting around the houses of parliament and finding out a bit more about this amazing building myself. The information shared about the suffragettes was really interesting and I think this would inspire curiosity in the children and a desire to want to find out more.
I'm already looking forward to book 2!

Love Sufiya Ahmed's historical fiction so I was delighted to have an early read of Time Travellers, the first in a fun time travel adventure series shining a light on lesser known aspects of our shared history. This book has some brilliant back matter on the women’s suffrage movement and the women often missing from historical accounts like South Asian legends Sophia and Catherine Duleep Singh and Lolita Roy. Children will love this one.

This is a beautifully written story for children and I loved every bit of it! As a primary school teacher, I am always looking for great new books to read and/or recommend to my pupils and I would 100% recommend this one! The action in this story kept me hooked and I know that children would be fully engaged too. The characters in the story share lots of powerful messages with the reader: friendship, doing the right thing, standing up for what you believe in and that there is so much more to history than we may know. I certainly learned a lot more about the Suffragette movement from reading this book and loved the way that it introduced this topic to the reader, as well as linking it to current issues that children may already be aware of. Every time that I thought the characters would be able to return to the present, there was another plot twist and couldn’t read fast enough to find out what would happen next!
I thought that this was a great start to a series and I definitely look forward to reading more in the series as they come along!
Thank you to NetGalley, Little Tiger Group and Sufiya Ahmed for an ARC in exchange for my honest review.

From the very start, this book is a thrilling adventure, with really nice parallels with modern-day protests and the protests they witness when they are dramatically whisked back in time to 1911. We join Suhana and her friends as they get into trouble, trying not to change history AND get back to their own time before dinner! Through Suhana's eyes we get to meet women from the suffrage movement that aren't so well known, and this book acts as an amazing resource to introduce this important period, as well as being an exciting story, and a very promising start to a series. Can't wait for the next one.

From the very first page, The Time Travellers : Adventure Calling whisks the reader off on a breakneck adventure led by Susana and her new friends, Mia and Aayan as they visit Parliament, only to find themselves in the middle of a suffrage protest in 1911. The parallels of protest in the past and present are brilliantly drawn, as are the historical details about racism in Britain and the exclusion of many voices from history. As she does in all her books, Sufiya Ahmed handles the historical detail deftly, weaving in information so effortlessly that is only when you put the book down that you realise how much you have learned. A wonderful opening to what promises to be a brilliant new series.

This does a great job of teaching the facts of a time period we don’t get many kids books about. Definitely has a place in classrooms as there’s loads of talking points, loads of history that can be covered!

Amazing,
Brilliant,
Really good,
Read it again Grandma....
Reviews from my grandchildren.
Personally I loved how it was educational in the form of an exciting book but don't mention that to them !

I love how this book makes a rather difficult period in the past seem accessible to younger children. The history of the suffragettes is a bit challenging to teach to young kids but this book makes it a bit easier.

It is a book about how Suhana and her classmates accidentally travelled back in time and get the chance to learn about how history unfolded back in 1911.

I would recommend this as guided reading as some of the historical facts might need to be taught with guidance.

This was a great little book with a wonderful message. Told through the story of Suhana, we follow her on a time traveller adventure to one of the key moments in history: 1911 and the women’s suffrage movement!

Suhana is on a trip to the Houses of Parliament with another few select members of her school (I actually learnt a fair bit about the history and the inner workings which I hadn’t known before!) but events take a turn. Her phone starts to beep and before she knows it, she finds herself back in time with the other two students from her school, Ayaan and Mia and they’re all flung into a journey to the past.

There’s nothing quite like the bonding experience of finding yourself 100 years previously, running from policemen and trying to get back home again. But they have some time to kill so why not explore the opportunity around them…

Suhana is shocked to see people like her fighting for women’s freedom, as she’s from Pakistan and has never heard of those involved as suffragettes and in women’s suffrage before. She also meets Reena Rao of Rajasthan, another surprising figure she hadn’t expected to meet.

Suhana not only gets to see an interesting slice of history, but returns home with two brand new friends in Mia and Ayaan.

There was also a great little addition at the end explaining all about key figures in the suffrage movements and more about the suffragettes. And as a nice add on, the Fridays for future campaign which can almost be likened to the modern day equivalent.

A great and important read for middle grade audiences with plenty of adventure and time travel excitement.

Fantastic. A story that transports young readers to 1911 in an accessible way, allowing them to experience what life was like. A very important message on the importance of allowing everyone’s story to be told. A great book to allow children to see themselves represented or to allow an insight into the importance of seeing everyone represented.