For the boy in search of a wartime melodrama ["Larry and the Undersea Raider"] is just about as up to date as it is possible to find. Its time is the late Fall of 1941, its setting Hawaii, where Larry Wilson, visiting his father, an American naval officer, is learning to ride a surf board….

Obviously this isn't a book to improve the mind, but it can certainly be recommended for a couple of hours of vicarious suspense and hair-raising adventure of contemporary flavor.

Ellen Lewis Buell, "The New Books for Younger Readers: 'Larry and the Undersea Raider'," in The New York Times Book Review, Part II (© 1942 by The New York Times Company; reprinted by permission), July 12, 1942, p. 10.