With out inconsistency, next morning he did New Testament Greek: The light shineth in darkness — to fos en te skotia fainei — and the darkness comprehended it not.
A portrait photographer who deals with the dynamics of light, Fos is also a classic specimen from "an age of hobbyists—of passionate, though part-time, scientists".
Perhaps in novels 50 years from now, similarly naive characters will reach for some seemingly harmless innovation of our time the cell phone, pest-resistant seed and give rise to the same reader's groan that greets Fos as he X-rays his beloved one more time: "Don't do it!
Indeed, Fos first views his wife-to-be through the glowing bulb at the end of her father's glassblowing rod.
Most western consumers are amateur enthusiasts like Fos, eagerly grabbing the latest miracle off the shelf.
Her protagonist is both a fan of science and its victim.Born in Kitty Hawk, where the Wright brothers first rose towards the sun, Ray Foster or "Fos", as if short for "phosphorescence"—is fascinated by radiance.
But she has a fine descriptive flair, and an ear for pith: "He wore that expression Fos had come to recognise in certain kinds of people of an iron reserve who never cry.
Yet having been employed during the first world war to light the trenches with volatile magnesium, Fos should have noted that men who are drawn to flame can get their fingers burnt.Fos's wife "Opal" and his swaggering business partner "Flash" replicate his nomenclatural luminescence.
It wants to close two uneconomic blast furnaces at Florange in Lorraine and concentrate its French steelmaking at its coastal sites at Dunkirk, on the English Channel, and Fos-Sur-Mer, on the Mediterranean.
With Aix-en-Provence it forms the second largest urban agglomeration in France, and in association with the outport of Fos-sur-Mer, about 23 miles (37 kilometres) to the northwest, it is the country's largest seaport.
Further expansion was also undertaken to the west of the city, with the creation in 1863 of Port-Saint-Louis-du-Rhône. Eventually, in 1965, work began on the development of the port complex at Fos-sur-Mer.
