OPERATION TYPHOON SHORE

The wild South Seas rumpus begun in Operation Red Jericho (2005) carries on as teen sibs Becca and Doug MacKenzie fetch up by chance on a remote island. There, a treacherous cabal within their vanished parents’ secretive Honourable Guild of Specialists, supported by an army of brutal Russo-Chinese martial artists-cum-mining specialists, just happens to have constructed a giant power generator based on the science of an ancient lost civilization. Set in the early 1920s and well-matched by both a suitably colorful cast and over-the-top illustrations that feature, in a gleefully seamless mix of fact and fancy, an array of old photos, supposed artifacts and intricately detailed fold-out diagrams, the high speed action opens in a typhoon, closes with a massive volcanic eruption and hardly lets up in between. Great fun for fans of Alex Rider, or such outings as Carol Hughes’s Jack Black and the Ship of Thieves (2001). (Fiction. 10-14)