Tennis Shoes Adventure Series

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The Tennis Shoes Adventure Series is a series of LDS fiction novels written by Chris Heimerdinger and most widely read by young adult members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

There are ten books in the series so far:

Tennis Shoes among the Nephites (1989)
Gadiantons and the Silver Sword
Tennis Shoes and the Feathered Serpent
Tennis Shoes and the Feathered Serpent, Part Two
The Sacred Quest (formerly Tennis Shoes and the Seven Churches)
The Lost Scrolls
The Golden Crown
Warriors of Cumorah
Tower of Thunder
Kingdoms and Conquerors (2006)

Heimerdinger's most recent book, Passage to Zarahemla, could be considered part of the Tennis Shoes universe, while not necessarily part of the Tennis Shoes series. It contains many of the same themes of time travel and Book of Mormon characters.

[edit] General synopsis

Spoiler warning: Plot and/or ending details follow.

The main characters of the series are Jim Hawkins and, later, his family and friends. The novels involve people from modern times being transported to the past (at various times and locations) by means of a cave in Wyoming. They feature both Book of Mormon and Bible themes.

The first four books feature Jim Hawkins as the main character; first as a teenager, then as a young man in college and finally as a father of three children. In book #1, he and his friend Garth discover the time passage and spend a month in the time of the Nephites, at the time of Helamen around 50 BC. In book #2, a few inhabitants of Book of Mormon times travel forward in search of an evil sword. Books #3 and #4 are two parts of the same story, when Jim Hawkins' teenage daughter, Melody, is kidnapped and Jim takes his children with him to early first-century Book of Mormon times to rescue her.

Then the books begin to take on a new twist. Books #5-#7 are part of the same story, in which many members of Jim Hawkins' now-large family visit the land of Israel in late first-century biblical times. Books #8-#10 also comprise a large story that seems to have not concluded yet, involving fourth-century Nephite settings in books #8 and #10, and the early-Biblical time of Abraham and Noah (close to 3000 BC) in book #9.