$8.99 paperback, when it opens
Not on sale yet. Nothing here has cleared the publisher’s own gate: no volume has a typeset interior, a print wrap, or an ISBN in either format, and the ebook price has not been ruled. Every free page on this site is finished and true — the whole first chapter, ten Field Notes, ten builds — and the shop opens when the books do. Write to orders@dinoroost.com to be told when.
Dinoroost · Book Ten of ten
Nine Minutes
The last episode of Season One. The Roost climbs down to be judged, and then it walks up-valley into two miles of standing gold light.
A hundred and twelve kids from downriver are camped on the Apron in matched coats, with nowhere to be and nothing left that obeys them. Somebody in the village broke the only law that has ever mattered here — nothing points at a person — so the Roost calls a sitting and asks the three questions out loud.
Then they walk. Seven hours up-valley, past the Notch, to two miles of standing gold light where one Tuesday morning three years ago never finished happening: a car still idling, bread still rising, and no sound at all. Everything they have is already in their hands.
Ten books. One season. One village in seven impossible trees, and dinosaurs that are asked instead of told.
The picture out of this one
Nine minutes standing inside the Glass. Two skies in one frame.
The spotlight
Lars and Odji
the finale
Rider, and the boy who says yes to everybody. He is the only person here who swims, and he says I’ll get that nine times a day and means it every time.
Matched to Bramble, Deinonychus. The runt of his clutch and finished growing. A crooked outer toe ticks on plank decking, so the whole Roost always knows he is coming — and he will not put a foot in water.
In the back — Field Notes
Maiasaura
Maiasaura — the nesting site that changed what everybody thought dinosaurs were.
In the back — Make It
A minute handed up a slope and handed back, with four people and a clock.
Household junk, numbered steps, under thirty minutes, and a number the child writes down at the end.
| Spotlight | Lars and Odji, the finale |
| Reading age | Ages 9-12 · Grades 4-6 · grade 3–4 text under a grade 4–6 story |
| Length | 21,338 words · eighteen chapters · a two-hour read |
| 5.5 x 8.5 in · Paperback, perfect bound, black-and-white interior · about 152 pages, not yet confirmed from a proof | |
| Paperback ISBN | not yet issued |
| EPUB ISBN | not yet issued |
| Illustrations | None yet — text and cover |
| Content | Peril yes, cruelty no. No child dies, no swearing, no romance, and nothing anybody builds is meant to hurt anyone |
| Written by | Jory Hark — a pen name |
Questions about this one
Eight answers,
from this book’s own file.
Every one of these is a fact out of the manuscript or the catalogue rather than a sales line — the measured word count, the drawings that actually exist, the animal on the nonfiction page at the back.
What happens in Nine Minutes?
The last episode of Season One. The Roost climbs down to be judged, and then it walks up-valley into two miles of standing gold light.
Who is it about?
Lars and Odji, the finale. Nine minutes standing inside the Glass. Two skies in one frame.
How long is Nine Minutes?
About 21,338 words across eighteen chapters, a cold open and a tag - roughly a two-hour read for a confident reader in the 9-12 band.
Is it illustrated?
Not yet. This volume ships with a cover and no interior drawings; Books One, Two and Three have eighteen each.
Do I have to read the others first?
Reading order is publication order, and there is no other order. This is Book Ten of ten, and it closes its own problem, so it can be read on its own - but the season runs a clock under all ten and it reads better in order.
What is the nonfiction page at the back?
Maiasaura. Maiasaura — the nesting site that changed what everybody thought dinosaurs were. The page names its own sources and says which parts of the story were invented, and it is free to read on this site.
What do you build at the back?
A minute handed up a slope and handed back, with four people and a clock. Household junk, numbered steps, under thirty minutes, and a number the child writes down at the end.
Is anything in it frightening?
Peril yes, cruelty no. No child dies, there is no swearing and no romance, and nothing anybody builds in these books is meant to hurt anyone - that last one is the first of the three Laws the series runs on.
Around it in the season
