Take Mutiny on the Bounty, throw in a little Harry Potter and you get The Rediscovery of the Bewitched Archipelago: A South Sea Adventure Fantasy by Samuel Gatz

The Rediscovery of the Bewitched Archipelago: A South Sea Adventure Fantasy

by Samuel Gatz

Here’s the set-up:

Chris, aged 13, discovers that many years ago his grandfather, Captain Wonder, visited an uncharted archipelago in the South Seas. The archipelago was inhabited by evil, black-magic sorcerers and gentle “natural” sorcerers, and was surrounded by a magical barrier that made the islands inaccessible to explorers from the outside world. After a year-long stay there, Captain Wonder was never able to revisit the bewitched archipelago because his first mate, Chamberlain, had stolen from him the nautical chart that would enable him to cross the magical barrier.

Chris spends his vacation on Hawaii, where he makes friends with kids whose grandfather, Kalua, was ship’s boy in Captain Wonder’s crew, and who has told his grandkids stories of his voyages with Captain Wonder. Kalua’s grandchildren suspect that there are links between the bewitched archipelago and Honolulu, and they have been investigating those links for years.

The kids discover that a ship from the bewitched archipelago visits Honolulu on a regular basis. When they further uncover a secret chamber on Oahu’s coast, their investigation takes a dramatic turn… Batara, a black-magic sorcerer visiting Oahu, discovers that his activities are being watched, and he kidnaps the youngsters. All of a sudden, Chris and his friends are on the way to the bewitched archipelago—a seemingly hopeless situation…
But as they are heading south, it turns out that the commander of the ship, Captain Cunning, who works for the ruler of the black-magic sorcerers, is a double agent, so to speak, and a friend of the “natural” sorcerers. Before Batara can deliver the kids to Garfin, the ruler of the black sorcerers, Captain Cunning organizes their escape.

The kids find shelter with Gatua, who is the ruler of the “natural” sorcerers, and Kalua’s childhood friend. Gatua reveals to the children that they have arrived at a very critical point in the history of the bewitched archipelago. The very existence of the bewitched islands is in great danger because the master adz, the most powerful magic tool of the bewitched archipelago’s sorcery, is lost. The master adz is necessary to renew the deteriorating magic in the magical barrier in order to protect their islands from being discovered by the outside world.

Gatua and Garfin, as well as Chamberlain, are searching frantically for the master adz, each of them for a different purpose. They know that Captain Wonder had hidden the magical tool somewhere in the outside world but their search has been futile so far . . . and the kids who unexpectedly arrived from the outside world are their last hope to find it.

After a challenging and suspenseful journey through the magical world of Polynesian sorcerers, Chris and his friends manage to return to Honolulu. But the question of the whereabouts of the master adz remains unresolved, and the very existence of the bewitched archipelago seems to depend on the kids’ resourcefulness.