Rick Brant
Volume 1
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| Author | John Blaine, pseudonym Harold L. Goodwin Peter J. Harkins |
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| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Genre | Adventure Science |
| Publisher | Grosset & Dunlap |
| Published | 1947-1990 (#1-24) |
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Rick Brant is the central character in a series of 24 adventure and mystery novels by John Blaine, a pseudonym for authors Harold L. Goodwin (all titles) and Peter J. Harkins (co-author of the first three). The series was published by Grosset & Dunlap between 1947 and 1968, with the previously unpublished title, The Magic Talisman printed in 1990 in a limited edition as the concluding #24.
In the series, teenaged Rick Brant and his former-Marine pal, Don "Scotty" Scott live on Spindrift Island off the coast of New Jersey, where Rick's father, Hartson Brant, heads the Spindrift Foundation, a group of scientists. Rick and Scotty are involved in various adventures at home and abroad. Besides Hartson Brant, the recurring supporting characters in the series include:
Various Spindrift scientists also appear several times:
The Rick Brant series has a scientific tone (being taglined as "Electronic Adventures" or "Science-Adventure Stories" and finally "SCIENCE Adventures"). The science in the stories is realistic science, unlike the fantastic science of Tom Swift, Jr.
Hal Goodwin was a popular science writer with a strong technical background and a sense of style unusual in the juvenile adventure-series field. The books are suspenseful, well-plotted, atmospheric, and enriched by humor and acute characterization as well as personal experience. Exotic locales such as tropical islands, the Philippine jungles, and the Himalayas were given vivid and well-researched depictions, as were a variety of specialized hobbies and professions, such as scuba diving, infrared photography, home rocketry, and the inevitable espionage work. Rick was also a private pilot who owned his own airplanes and used them in a number of the books. His first plane was apparently a Piper J-4 and in later books a Stinson 108. Like the Ken Holt mystery series, the tales appealed to a slightly older audience than did the typical Grosset & Dunlap titles. (Ken Holt had a crossover cameo in The Flying Stingaree, and Rick lent some of his gadgets to Ken in The Mystery of the Plumed Serpent, by agreement of the respective authors.)
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