Thrillers by Justin Scott
Treasure Island
A 1950s setting of the original classic follows the adventures of young Jim Hawkins, who leaves his parent's rundown tourist hotel life so that he may join Senator Trelawney and Doctor Livesey on a search for Nazi gold in the Caribbean.
Kirkus Review
Scott's decision to update Robert Louis Stevenson's classic tale of seafaring adventure and piracy might seem a quirky venture at first glance, but the results are surprisingly rewarding. The book began as a writing exercise when the author (Hardscape, p. 1423, etc.) found himself stalled on another project, but it soon turned into something of an obsession. He moves the story to the 1950s (it is difficult, if not impossible, to imagine it working any later than that) and begins the tale at the Admiral Benbow Hotel on the Great South Bay off Long Island. Jim Hawkins is an American teenager fascinated with boats; Dr. Livesey is Dr. Janet Livesey; Squire Trelawney has been transformed to a former US senator; Flint is a WW II vet whose treasure trove is gold stolen from the Nazis. Long John Silver lost his leg at Iwo Jima, and the gold is hidden in the Caribbean. Some of the minor detail differences are fascinating. The blind Pew is run down by policemen on motorcycles rather than horseback, for example, and it is a barrel of pistachio nuts rather than apples in which Jim hides to learn of the deadly plot among the crew of the Hispaniola. ``Yo-ho-ho, and a bottle of rum'' becomes, instead, a familiar wartime army ditty from the Philippines. Scott's conceit was to rewrite the original as closely as he could, line by line, paragraph by paragraph, updating everything to modern times. The result is a new awareness for the reader of just how wonderful a villain Silver really is and, more significantly, how well-paced and powerful a masterpiece Stevenson produced way back in 1883. An enjoyable enough novel on its own, this is especially delightful when read with a copy of Stevenson's version on hand for comparison.
Publishers Weekly
Scott, veteran writer of sea stories and mysteries (Shipkiller, Hardscape), sets this modernized treatment of Robert Louis Stevenson's classic on New York's Long Island in the 1950s. While often verging on the burlesque, the result offers up some amusing twists, particularly in its presentation of the characters. The most interesting update is Dr. Livesey, now a sexy, Gauloise-smoking woman. The Hispaniola has become a war-surplus salvage tug, while a bawdy WWII ditty replaces ``Yo, ho, ho and a bottle of rum.'' For the most part, the changes are engaging, and Scott deftly maintains Stevenson's superb pacing, rewriting the original virtually line by line. But, though the Americanization of the old English may attract a less scholarly generation of readers, those who have thrilled to the incomparable original will surely grieve for the loss of language. Moreover, while it may be intriguing to imagine a little hanky-panky between Senator (formerly Squire) Trelawney and the foxy Dr. Livesey, it is hard to picture Captain Smollett and Ben Gunn addicted to Fig Newtons.