Answering Children’s Impossible Questions by Isabel Thomas
Isabel Thomas, author of The Bedtime Book of Impossible Questions, tells the FCBG about her book and the reasons behind writing it.
Answering children’s impossible questions
Science is driven by questions, and not just sensible ones. Every year, the Ig Nobel Prizes honour the most improbable questions asked – and answered – by researchers. Is it safer to transport an airborne rhinoceros upside-down? Are cats liquid or solid? Why do wombats do cube-shaped poos?
However, even Ig Nobel laureates can’t beat the curious conundrums concocted by children.
Every time I visit a school, it’s the Q&A session I love the most. I tell the audience it’s their opportunity to ask anythingthey haven’t been able to find an answer to. Their creativity always amazes me. Are feelings made from atoms? What’s the opposite of a spider? Do watermelons have a self–defence system?
Children’s questions can be unexpected, baffling and even impossible to answer fully. But as a writer, they are a brilliant starting point for adventures in the real world.
The questions continue to flow at home. A 2017 study revealed that the average four-year-old asks 73 questions aday. And the average parent knows that the most wonderful – and hardest to answer – are always saved for bedtime!
Why am I me and not someone else? Why can’t I stay up as late as you? Why do I like my friends more than other people? Why won’t I live forever?
As one blogger brilliantly summed up, “At bedtime, my children turn into dehydrated philosophers in need of a hug.”
I wrote The Bedtime Book of Impossible Questions for these children – and for their grown-ups.
Collecting together the most bamboozling questions I’ve ever been asked by children, it’s a celebration of curiosity, and a treasure trove of answers written to be read aloud.
As well as tackling deceptively simple questions that are famously hard to answer – ‘Why can’t I touch a rainbow?’ – the book tackles some of the trickiest philosophical questions that children ask.
The underlying message is: it doesn’t matter if a question is impossible to answer fully. In fact, these are the best questions of all! They are the ones that kickstart conversations that help families explore life, the universe, and everything.
Of course, we all need enough sleep (the reasons are explained in the book!) so each answer is written as a short, self-contained bedtime story, subtly weaving in scientific research.
Aaron Cushley’s extraordinary illustrations add extra surreal detail and capture the infinite reach of a child’s imagination.
I hope The Bedtime Book of Impossible Questions leads to even more imaginative, improbable, impossible questions – and inspires the next generation of Ig Nobel nominees!
The Bedtime Book of Impossible Questions is published by Bloomsbury and is available now.
Views expressed do not necessarily reflect those of the Federation.