TWELVE-YEAR-OLD Mark Reynolds was a ringleader in whatever mischief was afoot among the boys of Kettle Cove, Maine. The best schemes for a rip-roaring Night Before the Fourth were always his, and it had been his idea to turn the lumberman Frenchie's cow loose in his shack.

But the spring that Mark's Uncle Andy came home a war hero, Mark decided to change. Uncle Andy had promised to take Mark or his brother, Lloyd, out to his fishing camp on Andrew's Island, and Mark was determined to be the one to go. He did not reckon, however, on all the unexpected things that happened that spring to upset his plans.

The humorous scrapes Mark got into while trying to "reform" and his good times boating and lobstering with his friend, Murder Beal, make this one of Anne Molloy's most warmly appealing books. It is a vivid story of real boys in a Maine seacoast village, with an exciting background of rocky coasts, clanging buoy bells, and treacherous fogs. Joshua Tolford's striking black and white illustrations add to the attractiveness of the book and make Mark and the other Kettle Cove boys seem doubly real.

From the dust jacket