April 15, 2012, will mark the centennial of the sinking of the Titanic in the frigid waters of the Atlantic. There are few who do not know the story: the unsinkable ship, the iceberg, the insufficient number of lifeboats, women and children first. And the band played on. It is against the backdrop of this catastrophe, and the days leading up to it, that Montreal-born author Gordon Korman sets his latest adventure trilogy.

Unsinkable introduces readers to both the lore of the great ship and the cast of characters who are the focus of the story. Never one to stray too far from stereotypes, Korman once again gives us likeable, if predictable, characters. Paddy Burns is a 14-year-old Belfast street waif scraping by as a pickpocket. When he and his partner in crime unsuspectingly target the brother of the head of the Gilhooley mob family, things take a turn for the worse, with Paddy narrowly escaping certain death at the hands of the gangsters. Thanks to a twist of fate, he lands on the deck of the Titanic as she leaves her Irish berth to begin her maiden voyage.

Paddy’s story drives the action of the books, and it’s a good thing that it does, as the other three protagonists lack his charm and richness. Fifteen-year-old Alfie Huggins is the son of a coal stoker on the ship; he lies about his age to gain a position as a steward. His discovery of Paddy results in, if not a friendship, then at least a sympathetic understanding that serves each in turn over the course of the first two instalments.

Farther up the social scale, Sophie Bronson is the 15-year-old daughter of an over-the-top American suffragist clearly based on the notorious “Unsinkable” Molly Brown, an actual passenger of the ill-fated ship. Sophie vacillates between admiration for, and embarrassment over, her mother, who never ceases to advocate, loudly, for “the cause.”

The other female lead also suffers mortification at the hands of her parent, but for vastly different reasons. Juliana Glamm is the daughter of the 17th Earl of Glamford, whose bad habits have decimated the family’s fortune.

While Sophie may not be quite as progressive as her mother in her attitudes toward class, equality, and women’s rights, her views are far more modern than those of the priggish Juliana, whose opinion of servants is that “their function was no different than that of any other useful item, like a broom or a motorcar.”

Korman spends much of the first book introducing and fleshing out the characters, as well as providing easily digestible bits of background on the Titanic, from technical details about its size and décor to the hierarchy of passengers and crew. He artfully weaves these facts into the story without sacrificing the elements of a compelling and exciting adventure tale – namely, a good dose of suspense and non-stop action.

Collision Course picks up where Unsinkable leaves off. The friendships between the four characters have solidified, and the secondary plot lines are given more room. The interplay between the characters of vastly different social statuses, the descriptions of the inner workings of the ship, and even passengers’ pastimes, provide ample material to keep readers turning pages. Add stowaway Paddy’s constant brushes with capture, and the book is loaded with interesting and pulse-quickening threads. And that’s all before the iceberg makes its tragic appearance. (However, one plot thread involving Jack the Ripper feels extraneous. With so much else already happening, is there really any need for more action?)

Korman has churned out more than 70 popular titles for young readers over the past 30-odd years. He has been criticized in the past for employing too cinematic a style, and indeed, some scenes in Unsinkable and Collision Course seem to have been plucked straight out of the 1997 James Cameron movie. That being said, Korman’s training as a screenwriter is an asset in this case, rather than a detriment,  imbuing his writing with vividness.

The books are also refreshing in that they aren’t overly simplified for younger readers. Plotlines revolve around murder, intrigue, social status, and errors in judgment. The language is mature, challenging readers in the best possible way. How many nine-year-olds are likely to have come across the term “Jacobean splendor,” which Korman uses to describe the first-class dining room? For that matter, how many adults know what that means?

Though best known and loved for his humorous books, Korman has proven here, as he has with the other adventure series he’s penned, that he is far from a one-trick pony. With luck, the trilogy’s final volume will prove just as unsinkable.