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Tim Cribb

Operation Red Jericho

by Joshua Mowll

Walker Books, $160

On the surface,  Operation Red Jericho is a follow-the-numbers kids' adventure story set in 1920 and taking place in Shanghai and the South China Sea. It has goodies and baddies, pirates and martial arts.

Central characters are 15-year-old Rebecca (Becca) MacKenzie and her rather smelly 13-year-old brother, Douglas. Their parents  are mysteriously 'lost in the desert wastes of western China' and they've been handed over to the care of their uncle, the one-eyed, bearded captain of a research ship who keeps a white Bengal tiger as ship's cat.

So far, so good.

The story purports to be based on archives left to author Joshua Mowll by Rebecca, his great-aunt, which reveal her involvement  in a centuries-old organisation called the Honourable Guild of Specialists, guardians of a secret force dating back to Alexander the Great.

The book is peppered with authentic-looking documents, photographs and papers to back up its claim to be true. There's even a painting that hangs in the National Gallery in London.

Hmm. Sounding familiar. Mowll's genius, though, is in his clever mixing of old and new storytelling devices, and a clear and intelligent voice that should appeal to both girls and boys.

Rebecca's diary entries and drawings of key moments by Douglas drive the main narrative,  a traditional method that sits nicely with the internet-like marginalia used to fill in the back story without intruding on the action.

Key characters get a photo and short bio, including Duchess, the ship's cat. There are breakout boxes, with diagrams and explanations - nautical terms and expressions, morse code, the difference between a junk and a sampan. Mowll is a keen sailor.

Foldouts such as on the weaponry, history and techniques of the Sujing Quantou warrior clan are fascinating and fun. They're handy  tools as the final third of the book takes on some explosive twists and turns.

Mowll's cast of characters is familiar -  rather Indiana Jones-ish down to the baddy  in the white linen suit. But there's nothing stereotypical about them, and each has depth enough to build interest as the story unfolds.

Nicely done is Douglas' appreciation of the difficulties of the martial arts as he watches 14-year-old apprentice warrior Xu. 'He made  it look easy, but Doug could tell by the tension in his limbs and the bright light in his eyes that it was not as effortless as it appeared.'

It's hard to fault Mowll's attention to detail and accuracy. He doesn't dumb down or distort. The science is good, particularly the research side, and will appeal to the natural curiosity of the young, and there's just the right balance of machinery, weapons and brains.

His sections on South China Sea piracy have a  contemporary ring, given the threat it still poses to those shipping lanes, and his head-shrinking Sea Dayaks  are far more real than the Caribbean wannabes of popular legend.

Mowll appears keen on the idea of letting kids find themselves, by themselves, free of the suffocation of adult supervision. With even the playground out of bounds, and television a nonsense, books remain somewhere for them to escape and think. They're in good hands here.



Operation Red Jericho