with aviation, in particular, warplanes. When Japan enters the war against the Allies, he is separated from his parents. He wanders through the disorder of war-torn Shanghai, learning to survive by using his wits. After meeting Basie on the waterfront, he and the American sailor are taken to a prison camp, where he learns much more about survival in the “university of life.” He adapts to conditions in the camp with a readiness not found among the European adults. By the end of the war, he has witnessed many scenes of social upheaval and apocalypse, including the flash of the atom bomb exploding at Nagasaki.

Basie

Basie, an American merchant seaman and profiteer. A man in his thirties with an easy manner, a bland, unlined face, and soft hands that he keeps powdered, he is articulate, observant, opportunistic, manipulative, and devious. Basie needs to have people working for him at all times and tries to exploit every event for his own benefit. In the prison camp, he uses Jim as a coolie, but he does teach Jim the necessity of satisfying one’s own needs and provides the boy with information about the outside world.

Dr. Ransome

Dr. Ransome, a British doctor in the prison camp. A sandy-haired, long-legged, strong man in his late twenties, he is opinionated, self-confident, somewhat bossy, and interested in helping others. He intercedes on behalf of the other prisoners in disputes with the Japanese guards and encourages the inmates to improve their welfare by growing a garden and building a sewage system. Dr. Ransome also tries to preserve English values in the camp. After taking an interest in Jim, he attempts to educate the boy in such subjects as mathematics, Latin, and poetry.

Mr. Maxted

Mr. Maxted, an English architect and entrepreneur who represents for Jim a Shanghai that existed before the war. He is a dapper, middle-aged, slightly eccentric man who does not adapt well to life in the camp.

Mrs. Vincent

Mrs. Vincent, the wife of a former stockbroker, a pale, nervous, exhausted young woman with thinning blonde hair. She is indifferent or hostile to Jim, but he is attracted to her as he matures.

Private Kimura

Private Kimura, a Japanese soldier and camp guard who is not much older than Jim and who becomes the boy’s friend.

Fox claims that "characters hardly matter in Ballard's decaying universe . . . [they] are no more than throbbing organic matter among futuristic objects, and the objects are slightly more interesting." Jim is the sole character whose mind and thoughts are accessible. His perceptions of the war and its aftermath, whether it is just beginning or whether it can ever end, are shaped by his imagination and tinted by his youthful grasp of events.

Jim, also known as Jamie, views the war and its consequences through the perspective of a child aged eleven to fourteen. As Jamie, he is the indulged young son of a British couple who own a cotton factory in Shanghai. He lives a life of luxury with servants, a chauffeur, a governess, private schooling, a swimming pool, and a social calendar filled with gatherings alongside other non-Asian families in the area. While Jamie is not equipped to survive off the land, he has enough resourcefulness to stay alive. When he is separated from his parents during the initial Japanese assault on the city, he manages to return to his home in the foreign section of Shanghai—though too late to reunite with his parents. His survival is partly due to his pre-war experiences of riding his bicycle around Shanghai. Familiar with the city and its perilous areas, he navigates the increased danger brought by the war, finding food and shelter as long as he has his bicycle. When his bicycle is stolen, jeopardizing his physical survival, his imagination takes over, leading him to the river filled with floating corpses and sunken boats. As he endures the hardships of camp life, he retreats further into the world he has created for himself.

In the first few weeks after being separated from his parents, Jim lives in a series of houses and apartments. The house on Amherst Avenue is the first. In this house, he is a little boy again, sleeping on his mother's bed, comforted by the scent of her clothes and cosmetics. He plays games in the garden, tries to identify the planes flying overhead, consumes food stored in the pantry while sitting in his designated spot at the dining table, and observes the water level in the swimming pool decrease. The life he once knew is fading as surely as the water in the pool. Even the house seems to transform, "withdrawing from him in a series of small and unfriendly acts." In a childlike manner, he races his bicycle through the house, leaving chaos in his wake. At the end of his wild ride, he leaves the house in search of his parents.

Initially, Jim rejects the idea of surrender, seeing it as dishonorable. However, he gradually understands that surrender is essential for survival, and honor becomes less significant. The will to survive becomes Jim's primary focus. While physical survival is crucial, mental endurance is even more vital for Jim. His fantasies, along with lessons in Latin and algebra and old Reader's Digest magazines, aid in his mental survival.

As Jim roams Shanghai in search of his parents, he encounters familiar faces whose attitudes towards him have shifted. The Chinese are now abusive, and the Germans appear anxious. After fixing the damage a soldier caused to his bicycle, Jim's subsequent journey through Shanghai reveals even more changes. The Chinese now seem to fear the Japanese soldiers, and the streets are littered with the bodies of dead Chinese citizens. Jim returns to the European quarter seeking food and assistance but finds neither. Instead, he retreats into books and magazines, constructing his fantasy world and adapting to survive. A group of Japanese soldiers feed him temporarily, only to be replaced by another group that chases him away. Barred from the familiar homes of his childhood, Jim is ready to accept his new identity from Basie. He is no longer Jamie; he is now Jim.

Basie and Frank are Americans who manage to evade capture for some time. Basie is the strategist, while Frank takes action. Frank informs Jim that Basie, a former cabin steward, possesses a collection of gold teeth extracted from Chinese corpses floating down the river. Basie uses these teeth as trade goods. Jim fears that Frank might try to extract one of his molars. Unable to sell Jim to slavers, Frank and Basie return with him to the house on Amherst Avenue, where they are captured by Japanese soldiers occupying Jim's house. Frank is beaten to death, Jim is taken to the open-air cinema, and Basie survives long enough to be incarcerated in the cinema, where Jim takes care of him, keeping him alive until they are transported to the camp at Lunghua.

Other characters from the camp remain in the background, occasionally emerging enough to reveal their features. Dr. Ransome provides food and education to Jim, sharing his meals and giving him lessons and homework. The Vincent family, with whom Jim shares a room, is separated by makeshift curtains. Mrs. Vincent speaks to Jim occasionally. Various elderly women come and go. Jim assists Mr. Maxted in collecting rations for their group each day. Many of these people care about Jim and attempt to help him, but Jim distances himself from them, turning them into mere figures in his imaginary world.