Hogsty Reef: A Caribbean Island Eco-Adventure

by John Dowd

Jim, Julia, and Marcel get in over their heads when Jim and Marcel’s boat washes ashore on an island that’s abandoned…or is it?
Teenagers Jim and Julia don’t know they are in for the adventure of a lifetime as they travel to Turks and Caicos to help Julia’s father survey the endangered coral reefs. Their explorations lead them to North Caico Island where they discover and befriend Marcel, a young Haitian refugee.
While the friends are fishing off the island’s reef one day, a fierce storm blows in and takes Jim and Marcel on a treacherous three-day voyage out to sea. As their food and water run out, the teenagers spot a barren island―Hogsty Reef―with a grounded tanker rusting off shore, where they seek shelter.
While searching for food, Jim and Marcel discover that Hogsty Reef is actually not abandoned, but a hideaway for drug dealers and their illegal drug money. While Julia works tirelessly to rescue Jim and Marcel, the boys must find a way to escape without alerting the drug runners, and survive the many dangers of Hogsty Reef in this suspenseful ecological adventure story.

187 pages, Paperback

First published April 1, 1999

About the author

John Dowd is a true adventurer, as well as a writer and photojournalist. He has worked as a seaman on a Danish freighter out of Libya; taught at New Zealand's Anakiwa Outward Bound School; paddled from Punta Arenas to Puerto Montt in Chile on assignment for National Geographic; and established himself in the Guinness Book of World Records by leading a 3600-kilometer kayak expedition from Venezuela to Miami along the Caribbean island chain. He is the author of Hogsty Reef and Rare and Endangered. He lives in Canada.

Awards:
* Arthur Ellis Award Best Juvenile (1994): Abalone Summer

Reviews

[Mary Ison · Rating 4 out of 5]

I picked this up from my Middle School library collection when I saw that the setting was the Turks and Caicos islands, where I went for spring break a couple of years ago. It turned out to be a survival/adventure story (boy is shipwrecked and meets bad guys on an island) with both an ecological (saving coral reefs) and political (travails of Haitian refugees) messages. I liked it!

[Charlie Zegers · Rating 2 out of 5]

I liked my son's last book report selection (Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy) a lot more, but this was a decent, but very straightforward adventure story, with enough science and local detail to indicate that the author actually knows his stuff.