Sperry, Armstrong Hull-Down for Action

Sperry’s late entry into the sneaky Japanese / arrogant Nazi World War 2 adventure novel genre is set in the South Pacific in 1941. Two recently hired crew of the trading schooner ISLAND QUEEN – a Japanese-American steward who’d formerly worked for Matson Line and a German 1st Mate posing as the sole Danish survivor of a torpedoed vessel – incite a mutiny and force the vessel’s American captain and three others (two Americans and a Samoan) onto a makeshift raft in mid-ocean. Before forcing the four onto the raft our nasty Japanese steward informs the quartet that he’ll be turning the ISLAND QUEEN into a Q-Ship which will lure Australia-bound convoys to waiting Japanese submarines. As a final aside, he tells them that this day itself will go down in history (it’s Dec. 7, 1941 – the two Axis baddies obviously know in advance that Pearl Harbor is about to be attacked). After a week or so bobbing about aboard their raft, the four Allies make it to a tropical island, Guadalcanal, no less. And there, after braving cannibals and the malevolent jungle itself, they meet up with a New Zealand intelligence officer who tells them that there is a secret Japanese submarine base somewhere on the island. The plot couldn’t get much thicker – but it does! While trekking to what they hope will be a secluded harbor (where an Allied schooner is at anchor), the trio (the fourth ISLAND QUEEN American had been wounded and was staying put on the island) come upon not the sailing vessel they’re looking for but rather the ISLAND QUEEN herself, now rigged up with munitions and ready to set sail to take on an incoming American convoy. Before you can say “arrogant Nazis aren’t as smart as they think they think themselves to be,” the threesome retake the ship (the Nazi is soon their prisoner). Naturally, at this instant a Japanese sub approaches (turns out the Americans have stumbled upon that secret submarine base) and, after the Americans lob some hand grenades and bombs into the vessel’s conning tower, the submarine is sunk (taking with her to his death the nefarious Japanese-American steward). Sperry’s tale concludes with the retaken ISLAND QUEEN en route to Australia, where the two Americans and the Samoan plan on signing up with the U.S. Marine Corps.