Tom Swift and the Visitor from Planet X

Tom Swift Jr. #17

by Victor Appleton II, Graham Kaye (Illustrator)

# 17. Format II. Composition binding. Blue End papers - Tom in lab. 8 to 11 illustrations and frontis illustration. Yellow spine with portrait of Tom. Lists to Repelatron Skyway

Genres: Science Fiction, Fiction, Young Adult, Childrens, Classics, Science Fiction Fantasy, Audiobook

184 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1961

About the author

see also Victor Appleton

The character of Tom Swift was conceived in 1910 by Edward Stratemeyer, founder of the Stratemeyer Syndicate, a book-packaging company. Stratemeyer invented the series to capitalize on the market for children's science adventure. The Syndicate's authors created the Tom Swift books by first preparing an outline with all the plot elements, followed by drafting and editing the detailed manuscript. The books were published under the house name of Victor Appleton. Edward Stratemeyer and Howard Garis wrote most of the volumes in the original series; Stratemeyer's daughter, Harriet Stratemeyer Adams, wrote the last three volumes. The first Tom Swift series ended in 1941.
In 1954, Harriet Adams created the Tom Swift, Jr., series, which was published under the name "Victor Appleton II". Most titles were outlined and plotted by Adams. The texts were written by various writers, among them William Dougherty, John Almquist, Richard Sklar, James Duncan Lawrence, Tom Mulvey and Richard McKenna. The Tom Swift, Jr., series ended in 1971.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tom_Swift

Reviews

[Jazzy Lemon · Rating 4 out of 5]

Written in the day when space exploration was on everyone's mind, this tale written captured the minds of children everywhere, a great story from the second Tom Swift series, actually written by the daughter of the author of the original series.
Edward Stratemeyer and Howard Garis wrote most of the volumes in the original series; Stratemeyer's daughter, Harriet Stratemeyer Adams, wrote the last three volumes.

[Nikky3 · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book was the most horrible in the best way. I am gona find and read the rest of them!

[Jlnpeacock Peacock · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was a 1969 edition. My father talked about the 1927 books he had checked out from his library when he was growing up and how delightful they were with scientific information and the projection of what the future might hold. I found one of those books and had loved it, so I was interested to see what a later book would hold as to adventure, mystery, scientific information, and speculation. The book was a great deal of fun. I think it would still be a good book for young readers today even if it is outdated as far as inventions. Good strongly overcomes evil and people do have happy endings. That is a pleasant experience these days.

[Alan · Rating 2 out of 5]

It was nice to escape into the past. I enjoyed the constant cliff-hangers. But the past was more paranoid that I expected. Overall, I would not recommend.

[John · Rating 2 out of 5]

This Tom Swift Junior title has plenty of thought-provoking tropes to help the reader forgive the bad writing and cardboard characters. Of course, it screams "SEQUEL," and indeed there were three.

[Janelle]

Dnf. Each chapter in the LibriVox audiobook started with a rather annoying electric guitar.

[Kent Archie · Rating 2 out of 5]

I think 10 year old me would have liked this better than current me.
The super science used to make earthquake machines and containers for brain energy
were just a little too much for me.

[Mark Rabideau · Rating 4 out of 5]

This story is quite simple and hokey, as one should expect. Although simplistic, it is all in good fun.

[Craig · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Tom Swift, Jr., books were a fun, upbeat, and interesting adventure series published for kids from 1954 to 1971 that promoted science, fair-play, patriotism, and team-work; they were good, positive books. The series served as a sequel to the original Tom Swift series that appeared from 1910 to the beginnings of World War II; Tom and his sister, Sandy, are the children of the first Tom and his wife, Mary Nestor; Tom's girlfriend Phyllis Newton is the daughter of Tom Sr.'s sidekick Ned Newton (now Uncle Ned to Tom and Sandy); the family home is still located in Shopton along Lake Carlopa, etc. It's nice that the continuity is preserved rather than just being over-written as happened to The Hardy Boys; in the first Tom Jr., book beings make contact that were first hinted at in the final real Tom Sr., book, Planet Stone, and throughout the series references to the history are made such as naming a device the Damonscope in honor of a character from the first series, Mr. Wakefield Damon. In addition to the Swifts and Newtons, Tom Jr. has his own sidekick, Bud Barclay, and there are several interesting supporting characters such as Phil Radnor, Harlan Ames (I wonder if Harlan Ellison was the inspiration for the name?), Hank Sterling, Miss Trent (who I don't believe ever had a first name), and especially Chow Winkler, Tom's cook, a former "Texas chuck-wagon" cook who was given to a variety of wild and unlikely expressions such as, "Well, brand my space biscuits!" The earlier books had nice covers, end-papers, and illustrations: Graham Kaye and Charles Brey provided the art for the first twenty-five volumes, followed by Edward Moretz, after which the artistic (as well as the literary) quality starting going downhill. Tom invented and built many fantastic inventions (but remember it was the '50s and '60s), and had many exciting adventures along with his friends and family. They faced off against saboteurs and spies and the evil Brungarians but their good spirits and hard work and can-do attitude always paid off in the end. The continuity didn't always hold logically from book to book, and looking back it's easy to pick apart one thing or another, but they were fun and fine books in their time. This seventeenth volume has a bizarre cover showing Tom and Bud apparently wrestling a demented space artificial Christmas tree. Tom has an interesting discussion about religion with Dad, while saving the world from Brungarian saboteurs and hosting alien intelligence.

[Rhonda Wise · Rating 4 out of 5]

This one is both a hilarious but awesome read. It is an easy read. It is full of the things that made me love science fiction as a preteen and teenager. There are still some things that are problematic because of when it was written and the differences in social mores from then and now, but they are not as bad as in other books in the series.

All in all, it is a great introduction to classic science fiction. It reminds me of the original X-men, Captain America and Spiderman comics read back in the day. Or in the Hot Rod Comics. Simple plots full of easy to read, enjoyable and vaguely 'clean violent' plots. The bad guys are threatening without seriously injuring or killing anyone. Yes, it is a bit nationalistic and faintly jingoistic. Yes, the girls are quaint, non-science/action or anything but pretty foils for the boys (this was in the early part of the 20th Century). However, that can be worked around and quite frankly, I'm used to it from this period in time. At least they are in the book, they do make intelligent comments even if they are not central to the plot, and they are not completely ignored as wallflowers.

Tropes? Definitely. But still decently done.

[bup · Rating 1 out of 5]

Yeesh. I mean, let me clarify. I didn't expect much from Tom Swift, but I thought the Tom Swift books were all old and would have a charming naivety about space travel and lots of goofy adventure fun, from the 1920's or something. Space motor cars and space dirigibles and the like.

Nope - 1961, jingoistic and not charming. Lots of use of the phrase "foreign accent" when describing guys that are obviously bad, lots of blond good guys. Sexist, too, and no space travel, except for one stupid thing to which we were not witness - we only greeted a 'space energy' coming from beyond to Earth. Oh, and then we had a reckless idea of what to do with the visitor.

This book reminded me that I hate the word "grin," especially as a verb. Has any good writer ever used the word "grin" to describe a human expression or action (don't tell me about the Cheshire Cat - not human, not intended as realistic)?

[Norman Cook · Rating 2 out of 5]

This review is based on my second reading via Project Gutenberg over 50 years after first reading it in its original hardcover edition as a child. This is one of the lesser entries in the series. Not enough time is spent examining the aliens and the repercussions of an alien contact, and too much time is spent on a fairly ridiculous subplot wherein an evil regime artificially creates earthquakes to destroy vital American infrastructure and how Tom creates an anti-earthquake system. As far as I can remember, the aliens play only a minor role in subsequent volumes in the series. The Tom Swift series is at its best when it deals with more terrestrial problems; introducing weird aliens and such reduces the credibility of the series (insofar as a YA science fiction series from the 1960s has credibility to begin with).

[Randy · Rating 4 out of 5]

Took me back to those youthful days when reading was just grabbing my soul. Tom Swift, along with Hardy Boys, played a major part in that.

Tom Swift is expecting a visitor from outer space, an electronic creature in which he has to build a robot to house the alien and allow it to function.

Enemy forces, a rebel group from the country Brungaria, are planning to hijack the being for their own purposes. A series of earthquakes striking America's defense plants sets Tom to thinking about how he would do the same thing and he designs the Quakelizer to counteract it.

A fun book.

[Rex Libris · Rating 2 out of 5]

When I was a kid I really loved the Tom Swift, Jr. books. They are OK, but not as good as the original series. In the original series, the technology that Tom, Sr. used was in keeping with the times. In the TS, Jr. books the science fiction goes well into the realm of far-out science fiction.

In this episode Tom et al host an alien intelligence and use the intelligence to foil the plans of the evil Brungarians. Among the evil plans the Brungarians have is an earthquake machine that creates factory-destroying earthquakes.

[Tony · Rating 3 out of 5]

As a young reader I avidly lapped up this nonsense, devouring all the Tom Swift books in the local library. Time has not been particularly kind to the books and my more acute adult sensibilities question the writer's attitudes to women and foreigners. Fun to revisit the past but definitely not serious.

[Stephen Theaker · Rating 2 out of 5]

Good, silly fun. If these had been in Keighley library when I was a kid I would have loved them. I enjoyed the free-wheeling, anything goes quality of it, but this must have seemed old-fashioned even in the 1960s. I love the idea of Victor Appleton II writing the adventures of Tom Swift Jr.

[for-much-deliberation ... · Rating 5 out of 5]

Another great Tom Swift adventure... this time we experience the likes of strange seismic activity, 'bad guys' from foreign countries and visitors from far off planets, not to mention loads of inventions and gadgets to make any danger fun, excitement and great entertainment as well...

[Frank · Rating 3 out of 5]

Tom Swift, Jr saves the United States from terrorists who have an earthquake generator. He and his friendship with outer space aliens help solve the problems. A little dated but a good read for the younger set.

The LibriVox recording is excellent.

[Bennett · Rating 2 out of 5]

I enjoyed the original Tom Swift series more than Swift Jr.

[Eric · Rating 3 out of 5]

I found this book rather humorous, I'm now looking for the others. I'll see about moving onto the earlier set. I love the terminology and ideas of sci-fi from nearly 50 years ago.

[Hikes in Rain · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great fun out of a bygone era. As an engineer, I wonder what I could do with the resources available to Tom and his father!

[Jerry (Rebel With a Massive Media Library) · Rating 3 out of 5]

A fun, cutesy old-school adventure novel.

[Cindy DeLong · Rating 5 out of 5]

The junior series is just as good as the original series.

[Ronald]

possibly read some time in fall 1966

[Chad Cunningham · Rating 3 out of 5]

Sheer lunacy.

[Bearcatgary · Rating 3 out of 5]

Tom and the gang halt terror attacks by Bungarian rebels with the help of mysterious lifeform.

[Marti Martinson · Rating 2 out of 5]

If I had read this as a kid, I am sure I would have thought it to be terrific. It's quite ridiculous, but fun.

[Amy · Rating 4 out of 5]

Old fashioned fun similar to the Hardy Boys only Science Fiction.

[Ronald · Rating 4 out of 5]

read some time probably in the latter part of 1966