Dean Ing

Dean Ing combined work as a novelist with experience as an Air Force veteran, aerospace engineer, and communications theorist. He became known for technically informed science fiction and thrillers, but It’s Up to Charlie Hardin shifts his attention to a boyhood adventure in World War II-era Austin, Texas. During 1942, twelve-year-old Charlie roams his neighborhood with his dog Lint and his friend Aaron, repeatedly testing the order to stay out of trouble. A secret route through an old oak, conflict with a threatening neighbor, and exploration of a narrow storm culvert turn familiar streets into a field for ingenuity and nerve. The culvert ultimately draws Charlie and Aaron toward a counterfeiting operation connected to wartime schemes and greed. Ing builds the danger from youthful curiosity rather than machinery or flight, letting games and local rivalries acquire serious consequences. It’s Up to Charlie Hardin presents courage as Charlie’s willingness to protect friends, investigate what others have missed, and accept responsibility when an adventure becomes genuinely dangerous.