Hunting the Dragon

After losing his job as a surf tour instructor, the main character becomes a boatman on the Lucky Dragon. The Dragon is a tuna fishing boat that uses illegal practices which end up killing dolphins. With the help of Chatter, a remarkable dolphin who always shows up at the right place at the right time, and an environmental group dead set on stopping the Dragon, Billy fights back. A bit far-fetched for my taste and the odd love triangle between the dolphin, Billy, and a pretty environmentalist didn't ring true. The action of the plot kept me going though.

I found this wooden, implausible, boring, and didactic. Too bad because the subject matter -- dolphins at the mercy of illegal tuna fishing boats -- has a lot of potential for a meaningful and exciting story. There were some good survival story moments when the hero Billy (the eighteen-year-old-but-reads-as-ten-year-old boy trying to stop a particular tuna boat called The Lucky Dragon, captained by the most stock villain ever to be written) is stranded at sea, but otherwise‰ÃƒÂ›_I have rarely read such awkward writing in a published novel. Not good.

Lots of action in this message-laden story about an idealistic teen intent on stopping a fishing boat from senselessly killing dolphins in its hunt for tuna. Occasionally effective but mostly overwhelmed with didacticism.