Bøger af Thomas Hudson

One thing all Tom Swift novels have in common is the lack of details about his lesser inventions. How did they come about? Were they part of something else of standalone projects? This series of four collections attempts to put the story behind the 'thingamy' as in, "Tom raced from the room pausing only long enough to cream the thin gamy into his jacket pocket knowing it might come in handy later on." Here is the second collection of tales of seven more of Tom's inventions, everything from his innovative fuel kicker that will get his into space as the first privately-funded astronaut to the creation of an incredible, life-saving ejection system for the military to an adventure on the Moon to devising an un-snoopable communications system, and a lot more.

Within each Tom Swift novel there are a couple major characters who you get to know, and a lot of secondary characters who walk in, say a few lines, and walk out. You never get the chance to know who they are other that in that contextI have set about writing back stories for these people. The novels may not have the 9,000 - 15,000 words to devote to giving you a good background story about them, but these collections do.This third book contains stories about the two men at Enterprises who are always getting mistaken for each other (and how they finally fixed that!), the journals of Doc Simpson and his many times spent fixing Tom after he has been injured, how Tom met his girlfriend while building his giant aircraft, the Sky Queen, the story of the Swift's super-efficient secretary, Miss Trent, and the tale of Tom and Bud entering a man-powered kinetic sculpture race.

For every Tom Swift novel there are at least one or two inventions that just seem to be "there" as if they always existed. Or, they are important but they don't really get described as to how they came into being or how they function. This book, like the other five in this series, aim to fix that.The ten stories in this collection are individually shorter than previous novellas, but they don't need to be lengthy. These are about 6,000 words each and can easily be read in a single sitting (or reclining.) The book includes: The Big Wheel - Tom designs and builds a fast monocycleFrom Toad to Pigeon - It is time to update the Pigeon aircraft, and Tom is being asked to come up with the new designThe Little Black Bag of Medical Tools - Doc Simpson addresses the AMA and tells them about the nifty tools Tom has created for himThe Pocket Drone - A chance letter gets the inventor working on a new type of drone that can save livesThe Mechanical Arm - An employee loses an arm in an accident, and Tom is determined to replace it with the best prostheses he can buildThe Wasp - The U.S. Navy needs a tiny helicopter and Tom believes he has just the thing, assuming he can prove something never tried can work!The Incredible Pen and Pencil - To Swift always has his pen radio and pencil soldering iron in his shirt pocket, but why did he make them and how?The Other Great Polymer - Tomasite is amazing but too expensive, so when Tom is building the Sky Queen he needs a new, strong polymerThe Kangaroo Kub - There is to be a midget jet carried in the Sky Queen, but can Tom design one that will land inside a moving hangar?The Repelatron - It had to come from somewhere and this is the story of how Tom came up with the very first concept, and it was years before he used it for a spaceship

Dee, Meg and Winnie DeChancy have a few things in common. First, they are sisters. Second they are triplets. Third, they are almost absolutely identical so the only way for the casual observer to tell them apart is by their personalities. Oh, and the fourth thing is they love racing around in their Criss Craft speedboat. In their first ever adventure the girls get the boat ready for a Spring Break race all around Schroon Lake, some 30 miles around the shoreline. But, as they prepare for a race promising "fabulous jewels" as a reward they discover that more than one person wants them to fail. In fact, more than one person would prefer they get injured, or worse! ---------------------------------- Though written today, this story is told in the style, and using some of the jargon and spellings, of something written back in the 1930s. And, that is exactly when this all takes place. It is the first in a planned trilogy of stories designed for younger and teen readers (perhaps from ages 9 through 17) but may be enjoyed by anyone feeling a bit nostalgic.

In this 12th adventure in the new Tom Swift Invention Series, Tom Swift decides his 4-year-old space station, the Outpost in Space, is now too small. When you outgrow something that you need, you make it larger or you replace it. Tom's plan for a replacement is not just ambitious, it is almost impossible. He want to build a giant space station capable of rotating to provide its 1,000 or more inhabitants with near Earth-like gravity, room to grow, and incredible surroundings. Two problems are in his way: money and getting all the materials up there. When even his own government appears to condemn his efforts and threaten to cut off his supply chain, Tom must turn to an alternate source for his building materials-mining what he needs from asteroids. But he needs a way to transport raw materials to Earth and finished goods into orbit. The solution has never been tried except in science fiction. He decides to build a space elevator. But with so many challenges and even the United Nations looking like they want to take over the new station, he finds that he is just about on his own.

One thing all Tom Swift novels have in common is the lack of details about his lesser inventions. How did they come about? Were they part of something else of standalone projects?This series of four collections attempts to put the story behind the 'thingamy' as in, "Tom raced from the room pausing only long enough to cream the thin gamy into his jacket pocket knowing it might come in handy later on."Of course, it usually is a vital device for him, but space and word colt requirements usually meant such details had to be left out.Now you have the tales of seven of Tom's inventions, everything from the origin of his Fat Man deep diving suit to the creation of a brand new kind of forest ranger to an evacuation ball allowing injured people in his outpost in space to get back to Earth to a new jet aircraft that will become a favorite of his in the New Tom Swift Inventions Series (also available from this outlet), and a lot more.

The Tom Swift adventure about his Rocket Ship doesn't tell much of the real tale. In fact it just assumes that things like Fearing Island exist and that his own father, Damon Swift, has nothing better to do than stand aside and watch.The truth is that Damon also built a new, privately-funded rocket as part of an X-Prize competition. His was unique with a whole series of obstacles to overcome and began even before Tom had finished his Flying Lab. This included locating and building out the scrub grass island, Fearing, off the coast of Georgia. That is a story in and of itself and is told here.This novel is the story of how Fearing came to be leased by the Swifts, how Damon became very good friends with the U.S. Senator who would play a large part in their lives, how he designed and built something looking more like a child's toy than a heavy-lifting rocket, and how he and Tom went into a private and friendly competition to see whose rocket would be launched first.It is a unique look into the father of Tom Swift.

In the early 1900s, author Peter Newell wrote tow special books for children to enjoy along with their parents. For the youngest, these were a "read to me" books. For children with a few years of experience, they could be read privately and enjoyed. Every page of story is accompanied by an illustration showing exactly what Newell pictured happening as he wrote the story. But, each book had something very special about it. For THE ROCKET BOOK, right in the middle of the text, from page to page, special pictures showed how the hole being made by the errant rocket grew and grew! For THE SLANT BOOK, Newell had everything set at an angle. Even the book was trimmed at an angle so the outside matched the inside. We are uncertain if these ever were published together (it is doubtful) but here they are. Together. To enjoy. Please note that because of their age, these stories are in the Public Domain.

Abey Staughton is apprenticed to the 'guvnor', a wheelwright and carpenter in Nether Oldston, a small village in rural Oxfordshire in the years before the First World War. He depicts the incidents of his daily life in a rural community: falling asleep after haymaking and cider, with Eva who adored him and Sally who was serious about him, which led to trouble; his turn as chariot driver, to rescue Sally from a bull; and his varied work with farm stock, timber and the tools of the trade, as gradually he absorbs the skills of a carpenter and wheelwright.A vivid depiction of how life was in rural England in the years leading up to and during the first world war.First published in 1988 by Tabb House, 7 Church Street, Padstow, Cornwall, PL28 8BG, UK, this edition is reproduced with their kind permission (Original ISBN 0 90701863 7)

In this 4th novel in the series, Tom is asked to help save the crew of a sunken nuclear submarine, and then to recover the actual sub before it can be claimed as salvage and stripped of its top secrets by a foreign power. His successful efforts lead him to being requested to undertake a monumental task: locating and recovering the more than half-dozen "lost" nuclear submarines sitting on the bottom of several of the Earth's oceans. More than that, he must also find their nuclear-tipped torpedoes and reactors, some of which are no longer with their hulls, and recover them safely as well. With nothing available from his own company, it looks hopeless until the U.S. Navy loans him a holdover from the Cold War, a gigantic submarine carrier capable of holding and launching several attack class subs. He refits it for the mission, trains a half-Enterprises and half Navy crew, and sets out only to discover that saboteurs, spies, possible terrorists and even foreign governments are out to see him fail.But the ultimate danger comes later when they discover more than anyone could have ever believed!

In book 26 of this new series, Tom Swift is requested to head a consortium of nations in developing and flying a new type of mission into space. He finds himself developing a brand new vessel, one that likely needs to fly into the sky, through space at incredible speeds, and plunge into the thick atmosphere of the only other blue planet in our solar system, Neptune.There are several things going against him starting with all he unknowns about the distant planet and its blue ocean that appears to be mostly liquid methane. How in the world, or out of it, can you get through something that might be absolutely solid once you get under the surface. Then, how to you withstand the pressures from a compacted, nearly frozen liquid that is thousands of kilometers thick?To top things off, one of the nations funding this project insists he bring back several tons of what they believe will be priceless methane diamonds. If he refuses, or if they believe he is holding out on them, there might be political and economic repercussions!

This is the 4th novel in the Lunar Saga (that started as a single novel and became a 2-book story then a trilogy and now this!).After making an underground inferno harmless and creating the Moon's first active volcano in millennia, Tom Swift is now trying to help the residents of the former slave colony on the dark side of the lunar surface as they try to build the first off-planet resort. But, there are difficulties that must be overcome.At the same time, Enterprises' head of Security, Harlan Ames, is determined to get to the bottom of one final mystery surrounding the former Masters, and disposing of some evidence he would rather keep hidden. All this takes him, and a civilian archeology team, back to the Himalayas.Unknown to anyone is a young man who has vowed to destroy Tom Swift for some imagined family disaster. He manages to get assigned to the Mood as part of the resort construction team, and sets himself up to kill Tom Swift!

Chow's 4th cookbook is filled with recipes for desserts and main courses along with special home-cooked puddings and some winter holiday dishes. These are the recipes he wanted to be able to perfect out under the open sky, but has found that they really work best in an actual kitchen with a real range and oven. Written in Chow's colorful manner of speech, once you get into the rhythm it is almost like having the man describe everything to you while sitting in your own kitchen.

In the 29th novel of this series, Tom Swift decides to "dust off" and see if he can make an early dream come true. At the age of sixteen he had built a small jet he called his Nuclear Hyperplane. It was anything but either of those things. Now, nearly sixteen years later he believes he might do something to make that dream come true. He sets out to design an aircraft that might travel at five times the speed of sound.Because he is award that he cannot continuously spend without bringing some sales into Swift Enterprises, he plans to build a hypersonic passenger jet capable of getting half way around the world in about three-and-a-half hours. It is an ambitions plan.It comes to the attention of at least two unfriendly entities, both of whom try to ruin his plans; at least one believes that killing the inventor is the way to accomplish this.By taking things in little steps, he inches closer and closer to his dream, but can he manage to do it while remaining safe?

In this fifth collection of invention novellas and short stories: TOM SWIFT AND HIS EXCEPTIONAL BATTERYWhen a valued employee has an opportunity to create a new and lifesaving device for use on the battlefield, Tom agrees to create an entirely new type of battery for it. TOM SWIFT AND HIS MULTICORDERThere are just too darned many things for the young inventor to keep hauling around for those times he needs some special devices, so he sets about coming up with an all-in-one unit based on a popular old TV show. TOM SWIFT AND HIS POLYMORPHIC GLIDERAfter rescuing a glider pilot it turns out that the father is a very wealthy man who wants Tom to do the impossible, make him an air glider that can fly like a bird, flapping wings and standing starts included.TOM SWIFT TAKES OFFA Young Tom Swift story. Nearly 13, Tom dreams of the day he can fly, but now thinks he can start with a rocket. First, though, he must build a viable solid rocket motor using the things he can find in the late 1940s.TOM SWIFT AND THE MODEL ROCKET MOTORThe son of a friend has become fascinated with model rocketry, something Tom can relate to. When the boy tries to make his own rocket motor, and is seriously injured, Tom decides to come up with a formula that is safe and powerful. An alternate look at Tom Swift creating a solid propellant.This is a shorter, bonus story.

Author Leo L. Levesque created an alternate world with a female Tom Swift along with a multi-universe with other Toms. His two-volume collection of the five stories may be found on Amazon.com and other locations. Author Tom Hudson couldn't leave well enough alone and so he set out to lampoon the "Tommy" stories-with Levesque's blessing. This volume contains the devastations of stories 1-3 in a matching collection to the first of Levesque's real stories. These may be read with or without reading the originals and actually contain much of the same plot.

In this 9th book in the Tom Swift Invention Series, Tom must suffer disappointment when a contract to build habitats for a Moon colony go to another, inferior, bidder. The result is a catastrophe, and Tom must mount a mission to recover the bodies of nearly a third of the colonists. When Swift Enterprises offers to build a protection system, that offer is rebuffed for no good reason. Angry, Tom decides to set his sights on an even more ambitious project: a colony on Mars! It will need to be huge and totally self-sustaining as no "quick resupply" system will be available. With a good understanding of the weak points of the lunar buildings he begins developing an inflatable habitat. He sneaks up to the Moon for a test and runs afoul of the company that built the fragile structures. He is even attacked by their rocket. Or, is it them? There are rumblings that Tom's old enemies, the Brungarians, are up to their old tricks and might be trying to sabotage Tom's efforts. Whoever it is, they seemed determined to stop Tom Swift!

In this 10th book of the new Tom Swift Invention Series, young inventor Tom Swift finds himself with a mystery. Someone is insisting on a face-to-face meeting but refuses to tell Tom why or who he is. All sorts of bells and danger whistles go off in his mind. When the truth becomes known, it sets Tom on a path that will see him building a flying vehicle capable of locating buried bodies, being pressed into a rescue mission when a volcano erupts and threatens to destroy a major city, which then catapults him right into the toughest assignment he's ever faced. Flying through space or swimming deeper in the ocean than anyone ever has been child's play compared to what he faces. The very earth under our feet has a mysterious tear that could destroy several New England states. Nobody knows how long it has been there, but it isn't standing still!It might even travel across the country eventually causing a super volcanic eruption under Yosemite. Tom has never faced the very planet he lives on as an opponent in a battle like this.

It has been a couple years since Tom Swift solved the mystery and overcame the aftermath of a loss of helium in the undersea mines he once discovered. Since then not much of anything has happened that might be considered newsworthy in Helium City. In fact, he and his friend, Bud Barclay, haven't even traveled down there in all that time.Things are about to change!A deep thrumming vibration begins to make itself noticed in Helium City. As it comes and goes with no indication of its origin or meaning, Tom designs and lowers a series of probes meant to discover what is coming from deep inside or even under the giant cavern filled with liquid helium. They give some answers and ask many more questions.In order to explore the possibilities-and impossibilities-Tom and Bud undertake a new adventure that sees them being lowered into the cavern in a totally unique sphere.What they find shocks them both, but they try to make a bad situation better. What they get is a bad situation getting more and more out of hand!

In this 7th novel in the Tom Swift Invention Series, the planet Pluto suddenly disappears. It is there one minute and gone the next. Is this the start of an invasion, or something even worse? Tom Swift is called upon to investigate. For starters he agrees to refurbish and move the long-defunct Hubble Space telescope into a position where it might scan the now empty area. Finding nothing he builds an ultra fast space probe. But when that disappears as it nears the missing planet's old position, it raises even more questions. A second probe is flung far to one side by an invisible force. The only thing to do is to go out himself, and so Tom sets about building a new, giant and incredibly fast spaceship, The Sutter. Before he can launch it, Pluto-or something slightly larger-reappears and begins heading inward toward the Sun. The problem is that the Earth is going to be right in the way. If Tom can't deflect this paradox planet from its course, all mankind might perish. But what secrets can this planet hold? And, why does it suddenly slow down inside Jupiter's orbit?

In this second collection of Damon Swift Invention novellas we begin by going back nearly 18 years to a time when Damon is working for NASA.Circumstanced there and at home demand he go back to save the family business. To do this, he must get the ball rolling on an incredibly simple but difficult to get manufactured car. This two-seater does something no other car can. it folds up into a narrow package fore easy storage. The only problem is, who wants something like that? This is an enhanced and updated version of a story that appeared in a collection of Tom Swift inventions.Next, we come to modern times where Damon finds himself in the middle of a potential invasion of either north America, Europe, or both by a hostile Asian nation. When asked to come up with something to safeguard the Arctic from these invaders, he comes up with an audacious surveillance robot.Then, his vacation in Brazil is interrupted when he is kidnapped by a member of his own government, told of a potential for a terrible outbreak of disease, and requested to find a way to save members of an elusive tribe stuck int he middle of the danger zone.To round the book off, there is an all-new short story. "Damon Swift and the Scuttle-By-Wire Rat" that takes him back into the worlds of robotics and sewer systems.

In book 28 of this new series, Tom Swift finds out that a wandering planet is coming into the solar system, and while it will not hit or even come close to the Earth, its trajectory will take it around the Sun and into a near miss (or possible collision) with the super giant, Jupiter many months later.That could cause untold damage to Earth if enough of that planet breaks off and heads inward.Without a lot of solid evidence as to what it will really do, but a very short time period in which to do something, Tom decides on a bold move to get this new planet, named Wanderer (for obvious reasons!) into another path that will not impact any part of the solar system before it leaves in about a year.He runs afoul of an old nemesis who holds a personal grudge more than a decade old plus an unscrupulous woman who seems out to avenge an old rivalry between Damon Swift and her mentor. The biggest problem is that her interference could spell disaster for the entire population!Time is not on Tom's side as he struggles to get his solution to the forthcoming disaster in place. Even before he knows if he has been successful, Tom makes a startling discovery!

This 6th novel in the Tom Swift Invention Series brings back some of Tom's old acquaintances: his Space Friends. Since their first interaction several years earlier, Tom has tried to get them to provide details about themselves so he can assist them in their mission to visit the Earth. Until he makes a surprise advancement in how he "reads" their symbol messages, he has had frustration after disappointment trying to get them to tell him anything of substance. Now that he has an understanding he is horrified to find that their "masters" have declared their mission to our solar system to be a failure and will be recalling them, forever, in just a few short weeks. Now he races against time trying to develop both a vehicle and an environment capable of supporting them. Just when he thinks he has succeeded, disaster strikes. Not only is his new flying environment destroyed, but now the Masters insist the Space Friends won't be the ones coming for a visit, it will be them! Tom knows that can't be allowed and so he must work overtime to complete a new environment, be a diplomat and get ready for the visit.

Harlan Ames-formerly the head of Security for Swift Enterprises in the Tom Swift adventures-has made the Moon his permanent residence for decades. More than he cares to think about. Now, as the Chief Commissioner of Security for the Dark Side of the Moon, he tries to let his underlings do the hard work. But, after falling for a singer in one of the nightclubs, he finds himself deep in her troubles as she is arrested for murdering a man she knew years earlier. To make things worse, the man's wife comes up to serve him with divorce papers only to find him dead and Harlan's lady friend the obvious one who did it.What's a cop supposed to do, and how does he keep up his hard-boiled dick persona?This a a fun and funny mystery written in the style of the detective stories of the 1930s and 1940s with a good heap of science fiction tossed in.Oh, did we forget to tell you there is an absolutely horrible weapon and the overthrow of all of Russia and ... well, read the book!

Story One: Amateur sleuths Drew Nance and his boon partner, Carl Keene, decide to celebrate Christmas with Drew's aunts Agatha and Christa. Things would be just fine if the ladies hadn't stepped outside on Christmas Eve. You see, Santa Claus has just been shot and killed and fell off their roof. Well, a man dressed as Santa with whom the ladies have a longstanding feud. And the police find one of them holding the smoking shotgun that killed him. Story Two: The men were on their way west to Colorado to see about finding a dog that has been playing two families, but they get a little sidetracked when Carl discovers a dead body in the ice cream freezer at a local megamart in Indianapolis. Drew can't keep himself from wanting to investigate despite the facts that the local police do not want him to, the employees of the store are all dead set against helping or even speaking with him, and a mysterious man seems to be training them. Of course, there is the incident where they get knocked out and shoved into the same freezer to die overnight. And the ambush set up by one employee who really has never been very helpful up to the point he suggests he can assist them. These two Drew Nance novellas, written totally tongue in cheek, are really mystery stories featuring a pair of amateur sleuths with strangely familiar names. Story Three: Bonus printing of Tom Swift and the Loch Carlopa Monster, the story that introduced the world to Drew and Carl. For the price do not expect this to be another Poirot or Marple or Dupin experience, but they are entertaining, at least to the author.

In the twenty-first novel in this new series, Tom has defeated the Electricity Vampires and now wants something a bit less diabolical to take up his time. A new X-Prize is announced that intrigues him: fly a solar-powered aircraft, non-stop, around the globe in just 36 hours!That sort of speed will require an electrical powered jet, and that will burn up a lot of electricity. So, how can he manage to make what he needs by day... and still have enough to run at full speed at night?Might his recently discovered cousin in England, Thomasina Swift, be of some assistance?Complicating things is a mysterious woman and a deadly opponent out to keep Tom from winning or perhaps from ever getting back home.

No, these stories are not about Oz the Great and Powerful, or even the Munchkin-infested land of Oz, they take place, in good part, in Australia. Everyone knows that young inventor Tom Swift creates wonderful inventions, but how many realize his father, Damon Swift, is an even more accomplished inventor? This collection of three novella-length stories tells the tales of three of his, well, odder inventions, all created for use in Australia. These stories are: Damon Swift and the Mechanical Fish - When the Royal Australian Navy finds that no company down under will be able to offer what they want, a desperate Navy Captain sends the specifications to Damon. At first the request for a two-man submarine seems more than reasonable until he gets to the pages that say it must look like a fish, swim like a fish and even sound like a fish! Damon Swift and the Reconnaissance Gull - One year after delivering the submarine, Damon receives a plea from the same Navy woman. Now, no company in Australia or New Zealand will even consider taking on a project calling for 300 autonomous drones, capable of flights 1,000 miles out and back with at least 12-hours on site. Sure, they can build large, jet powered drones complete with weapons if needed, but only Damon will take on a project calling for the drones to look and fly just like seagulls. And, in typical Damon Swift style, he delivers the goods even though an unscrupulous politician and a rogue Admiral are out to see the project fail! Damon Swift and the Rapid Delivery Kangaroo - Just as inevitable as the harshness of the Outback are all the strange animals that abound (and bound around) in Australia is the difficulty in getting things delivered to remote areas. When a woman Damon knows slightly leaves politics and takes on management of a specialty delivery company serving those more remote parts of Oz, she finds herself up agains a company whose former management all but stole the kitchen sink, has an aging fleet of delivery vans and a trio of old and tired aircraft, and is out of ideas. Damon comes to her rescue finding ways to not just save money (and the company) but to make it one of the most organized delivery services around.

In novel 18 of this series, Tom Swift gets the call to put his inventive brains to work for Hollywood. A producer for one of the studios wants to resurrect the old movie series that featured a hero using a flying rocket pack. But, when Tom convinces him that roaring flames and something looking like a pair of fire extinguishers isn't going to work, he agrees to set his serial in the near future. That just leaves Tom with the task of creating a wearable, flyable backpack that can fly for a half hour at a time, be absolutely safe for the stunt man to pilot, and look really incredible.Forces are at work to steal such a technology from both Tom and another company in California that tried making something like it a year earlier. And, it turns out to be an old enemy of the Swifts behind it all.Now, with pressure put on him by the US Government and constant nagging requests to get the backpack delivered to the movie set, Tom must satisfy many people, keep the plans and actual device safe, and still get his and Bud's wife out to Hollywood to meet some stars.

Years after Damon Swift saved NASA's reputation as an exploratory service to The United States, Enterprises is approached for a repeat. Only, this time it is to be much more than the old Jupiter Skimmer's flight into the atmosphere of the gas giant. Now, they want to do flybys of all the major moons of both Jupiter and Saturn with appropriate photography and even some remote spectrography."They still don't understand all we can do! we can give them landings, and even better science." Tom complains as he plans to answer their request with a much broader program of exploration. One that does not rely on their, "Must have a crew of no fewer than five and no greater than nine." Their friend and political guardian, Peter Quintana., comes to the rescue with information this exploration comes in response to Tom's own horrible experiences with a u.N. subcommittee's roughshod handling of a probe project Tom completed just weeks earlier.He knows that such a voyage is far too long for a human crew to stand, and there will be little or no way to get replacements out to them given the space agency's limited budget.So, what can he do? Well, how about a small squad of non-humans?

In what might be a publishing first, a teen reader/adult mystery story has been rewritten specifically for young readers, as young as 3rd grade for some advanced readers. It may be read by children with or without help, and can be thoroughly enjoyed as a read-along where a parent is reading the original version of the book ("Brains Benton: The Case of The Insane Woman Down Memory Lane") at the same time. Brains and his best friend Jimmy have started a detective agency to take on cases the police just won't take seriously. And, being not-quite-teens themselves, the police do not take them seriously either. But they have a few early successes and it is only when Jimmy's older sister, Ann, asks them to look in on a favorite old teacher of hers who had been fired and sent to a mental institution, that the real mystery begins. Can it really be true that aliens from outer space are out to get her? What the boys learn for certain is that sometimes the best way into a crazy person's house is by climbing up a wall, and that water in a basement isn't at all a good thing! PARENTS NOTE: Brains and Jimmy are very good role models for children showing bravery, intelligence, and a mature attitude toward the main character and her daughter. This book has been rewritten in third person rather than the fist person narrative of the original book to make it easier for younger readers to follow along.