A gun from The Weapon Shops of Isher by A.E. Van Vogt. Built by alien technology, they could only fire defensively, but they always drew and fired when needed to protect the owner and they were always effective against the threat.

A gun from The Weapon Shops of Isher by A.E. Van Vogt. Built by alien technology, they could only fire defensively, but they always drew and fired when needed to protect the owner and they were always effective against the threat.

As a kid I went through every Tom Swift book. Then Mike Mars, Astronaut; Tom Corbett, Space Cadet; Everything Tarzan and related. But Swift was the first. I got a dollar a week for allowance, went to E.J. Korvettes, which had a book section, and bought the latest release. This was about 1960 or so.

I read it in my 60’s and was really surprised how much I enjoyed it. The writing is pretty darn good and the character development moves it as much as the plotting, which gets kind of schematic in places. I’d bet you’ll like it.

Our highest assurance of the goodness of Providence seems to me to rest in the flowers. All other things, our powers our desires, our food, are all really necessary for our existence in the first instance. But this rose is an extra. Its smell and its color are an embellishment of life, not a condition of it. It is only goodness which gives extras, and so I say again that we have much to hope from the flowers. Sherlock Holmes (Conan Doyle) The Naval Treaty.