Island Feud

Dave Jenkinson is Associate Dean of the Faculty of Education at the
University of Manitoba.

Another in Crook’s series of mysteries featuring 16-year-old Susan
George of Chilliwack, B.C. Summer finds Susan visiting Carpenter Island,
one of the B.C. Gulf Islands, at the request of her cousin Carol
MacMillan, 18. Carol, with her “friend” and business partner Eliot
Michelson, has a contract with the fisheries department to raise salmon
in sea cages as part of a nutrition experiment related to commercial
fish-farming. While Carol’s and Eliot’s long-term goal is to become
fish farmers themselves, they find their plans opposed by two principal
sources. One is Eliot’s accountant father, Todd, who simply
“doesn’t approve in general of anything Eliot does.” The more
sinister opposition comes from Jude, a leftover from the island’s
hippie days. While Susan recognizes Carpenter Island’s increased
urbanization since her last visit six years before, Jude, who wants to
return the island to its more rustic days, perceives fish-farming to be
just a new form of urban pollution. Sharing the goal of stopping the
experiment, Todd and Jude form an odd alliance. While Todd uses words as
his weapons, Jude resorts to sabotage and various forms of violence,
including attempts on Susan’s life.

While an acceptable mystery for the middle-school crowd, Island Feud is
the least successful of the Susan George mysteries. The book lacks the
emotional tensions found in Crook’s other titles, principally because
Jude is not a credible villain. His motivations for disliking Susan to
the point of wanting to kill her are just not made believable. As well,
Crook has included a number of weak subthemes, such as Susan’s
changing relationship with Alan, her RCMP boyfriend, that really do not
mesh well with the mystery genre.