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.
About the Author: The author isn't whom he seems to be. He is, in fact, a wholly other person who writes things like this book under the pen name of T. Edward Fox. He also writes under four other names including his own. He is a veteran of the Viet Nam War era, was awarded several commendations for excellence at performing his job, got out and took full advantage of the G.I. Bill for about a year before deciding he could make more money without a degree than with one. Working in the electronics and computer industry for a quarter century saw him at companies like Atari and Apple where he won an award for creating the first widely distributed and fully interactive training CD-ROMs allowing training for sales and support of all new Apple products of more than 20 individual products on a single CD. He is retired and doesn't quite make a living out of writing, but he has fun. Periodically he pulls out paper tubes and balsa wood sheets and make model rockets. At one point in his life he read 4-5 novels a week. Now, he writes them. Obviously, not that quickly, but 4 or more a year. He also is absolutely great at making things up. When he has a good target to deal with he can look them in the eye and tell them things they can't quite not believe. He did this with one person for over 25 years before the other one caught on. He could be a great salesman of things people don't actually need, but is too honest for that. Some of the above might actually be true.