Jehan and the quest of the lost dog by Rosanne Hawke
UQP, 2017. ISBN 9780702259609
Recommended. When the monsoon hits Pakistan earlier than usual, its
devastation is particularly ferocious, causing villages to be swept
away, crops and towns annihilated. Rosanne Hawke lived in Pakistan
for ten years as an aid worker, often returning to the place she
loves, and writing stories brimful of understanding and empathy. In
Jehan and the Quest of the Lost Dog, a companion story to Kelsey
and the Quest of the Porcelain Doll (2014), Jehan is a young
boy who survives the flooding of his village, finding a tree to
shelter in, pulling his string bed up behind him as a platform to
lie on. When he can beat the monkeys to the mangoes in the tree, he
can eat, but life is lonely especially remembering his family and
where they might be. Into his world comes a small dog, and they
salvage stuff from the water rushing by, the dog disappearing to
tend to her pups. From his tree Jehan can see what is left, and
amongst the rubbish that passes by is a man offering to take him
with him to the city, telling him that no one has survived the
flood. But when the dog returns he has a green ribbon tied to his
collar, giving him hope. Another man takes him to a refugee camp,
where Jehan finds the dog's owner, and together they search for
their families.
Throughout the story we hear of Jehan's village, his life with his
family, his mother's stories, his school life, what he wears and
what he eats. Hawke delivers a background uncompromisingly
authentic, as she tells of the effect the 2010 flood had on the
whole state, the worst in living memory cutting a swathe thirty
miles wide, destroying all in its path.
Jehan clings onto his life in the tree, determined to find his
family, because that is what is most important and all readers will
understand this as they read of this boy.
Throughout the story Hawke uses Urdu for some of the often used
words, bed, dog and family names for example, and a glossary at the
back of the book explains what they mean. Included too is a brief
outline of the devastation of the 2010 flood to the country, a place
already impoverished by years of terrorism.
Fran Knight