Thursday 2 December 2010

The Secret Of Shark Reef

The boys accompany Mr Andrews up to Santa Barbara, where he is working on a story involving the crime writer John Crowe, who is organising a protest against an oil drilling rig near to Santa Cruz island. Crowe also has his own mystery, which the boys help him with - his fuel is being depleted, as if someone is smuggling and using his boat to accomplish it. With some vivid set-pieces (the storm and the submarine, especially), a great sense of location, some nice background work with environmentalism and a cracking pace, this works well as a mystery even if it is a bit too convoluted for its own good. Although not the best Arden book, this is probably a fitting end (to my mind anyway) to the ‘proper run’ of books (Hitchcock died shortly after this was published) and, as such, is well worth a read.

4 comments:

  1. For some reason this one bored me a little bit. Technically the story wasn't bad, but was one of my least favorites.

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  2. The scenery is great in this one but that's about it. The story goes out a snail's pace and I don't agree it is a strong entry. It would be in my bottom 5 of the first 30 books. There are actually five or six books AFTER this one (Which I still consider part of the original series) that are far better stories.

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  3. I really liked this one. Pete was always my favorite, and I liked the fact that he outsmarted everyone in this book.

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