Oh, if only I had mod points.
In fact, I started smoking because of the military. I did a lot of bitching of my own about my mother's smoking when I was a kid, then turned around and started doing it once I was an "adult." Anything to take the edge off that stress.
I'm a bit late on this, but something he should keep in mind is that the Lucky Starr books are a bit dated in their science. I'm not sure if you're going for "fun read" or "get the kid into genuine science," but there are parts of some of them that are flat-out wrong.
"Lucky Starr and the Oceans of Venus" is the most obviously incorrect one, but I seem to recall that the original one ("Lucky Starr - Space Ranger") got some things wrong as well. Just something to keep in mind - a lot of Asimov's stuff has aged extremely well, but that particular series didn't.
Also, the pen name was Paul French - but the volume I have also has Asimov's name on it.
... as a rumor, at least.
I worked with high-power RF in the military for 5 years, and it was "common knowledge" that the SHF curse was alive and well. Men who worked with the radios had the "curse" of only having female children when they had kids at all. As such, I'm totally unsurprised at reading this.
I'm just imagining Lou Piniella shouting at a robot umpire, taking off his cap, throwing it on the ground at the robot's feet, picking up a base, throwing it down the right field line, picking up the robot ump, carrying it with him, throwing the base some more, and repeating.
I'm sure it'll be hard for you to overstate your satisfaction.
The first thought when I read that was "... is this a P-47 or something?"
Is it possible this thing's major failing is that few people have heard of it? (ignoring that if it comes from Apple, it's probably a proprietary standard with licensing fees to match...)
... if you're going to do something dodgy, you put fake names into your software registration fields.
"I don't believe in sweeping social change being manifested by one person, unless he has an atomic weapon." -- Howard Chaykin