No comments about Dalai Lama Autobiography (Bunshun Bunko) Japanese Language Book.

5 comments about Three came home (Mermaid books).

1. After seeing the 1950 Claudette Colbert film version of this book, I was interested in reading the memoir on which the film was based. Agnes Keith was married to a British government officer when the Japanese took Indonesia during the early days of World War II. Keith and her toddler son were taken to a POW camp; her husband spent the rest of the war in a men's camp under even worse conditions. Keith's memoir describes the starvation, the cruelty, the inhumane conditions, disease, torture, hard labor and the women's superhuman struggles to keep their children alive and relatively healthy. The story is not only about survival, but about the power of love. In the book an occasional racist remark, typical of the times, creeps in, but she also occasionally inserts insights into the humanity found even in some of her captors, and certainly in the Indonesian people. The book ends with little bitterness, and primarily a plea for peace. The film was remarkably faithful to the book, sanitizing and softening some details because film audiences weren't expected to see Claudette Colbert fighting rats, living in abject filth, or dropping down to 80 pounds. The film is still very powerful; the book even more so. This is a well-bound trade paperback edition.



2. This is one of the best written book I have ever read. Very emotional A DEFINATE MUST READ BOOK



3. This book contains the wartime memoirs of Agnes Keith. In 1939, Keith published a book "Land Beneath the Wind," describing her life as the wife of a British colonial official in Northern Borneo. She and her husband Harry were on home leave in North America in 1939 when she finished writing the book. However, Harry was called back early to Borneo from his leave because of the war clouds on the horizon. Agnes, who was pregnant, soon followed, and several months later, gave birth to their son George in Sandakan. Although there had been talk of evacuating women and children from colonial outposts in the Pacific, no orders came through for evacuation before the Japanese invasion, and Agnes refused to leave Harry behind voluntarily. Thus, when the Japanese arrived, all three Keiths were still in Sandakan, and were soon interned in prisoners' camps for the duration of the war. In this book, Keith recounts the stories of how she, George, and Harry survived life in the camps. Her tale was so remarkable that it was made into a movie shortly after the war.
   
   Readers of Keith's earlier book will be stunned at the change in tone of her writing. In Land Beneath the Wind, Keith writes with an airy, scattered-brained style, almost as if she were afraid that otherwise, she would be taken too seriously. Indeed, it was perhaps her humor itself that made her first book popular. But the light tone is gone completely from this book. The nightmare of the prison camps, where random beatings were a certainty, but food was often unattainable, and hygiene nonexistent, took away her carefree nature and matured her overnight beyond her years. For more than three years, she struggled daily to find any kind of food for George, from wormy rice to just plain worms. This woman of colonial privilege traded family heirloom jewelry for a chicken, and learned to hoard night soil for use as fertilizer.
   
   From the start, the Japanese camp leader recognized her as a special prisoner, because he had read Land Beneath the Wind. He required her to keep a journal of her camp adventures for future publication to show how "humane" the Japanese treatment of prisoners had been. So every day, after she completed her required prison work, she had to write for this commander about how wonderful camp life was. When that was finished, she secretly wrote up notes describing what life was really like, and hid them in cans buried under their huts or in the latrines. The most amazing part of her experience is not only that she and George and Harry survived at all, but that through it all, she managed to come away from the camps without blind hatred for the Japanese. She recognized that some of the prison guards were evil, but that many couldn't help but obey their superiors. The years of captivity for the Keiths robbed them of their youth, their health, and the better part of George's childhood, but Agnes finds fault not with Japanese people, but rather with the idea of war itself.



4. Three Came Home is a well-written, true story of a woman and her son's internment in a Japanese prisoner of war camp in Borneo during WWII. Agnes Newton Keith creates a vivid portrait of the conditions under which the prisoners lived and of their day to day lives. She also makes it clear that people are not inherently good or bad; they are often victims of circumstances. Her love for her son and hope that they will be reunited with her husband keep her going and morally-centred. An absolutely excellent book!



5. As much as "Three Came Home" is a story of war, it is a story of love. Mrs. Keith's love for her husband and son are paralleled with her hatred of internment. She balances the good in people, even the enemy, with the bad. The clear message is that war is what makes people bad. I enjoyed this book. It is beautifully written, with every sentence eliciting some kind of emotion in the reader. Mrs. Keith is an admirable woman for her literary accomplishments and her ability to share her experiences on a very personal level.

No comments about SUSANOO Autobiography (Shueisha Paperback) Japanese Language Book.

1 comments about Traveling life's twisting trails.

1. If your reading this review, you likely fall into one of three categories: a family member of the author, a student of the WWII POW experience/Wake Island/the LDS experience of WWII, or your looking for something else with a similar title.
   In "Traveling Life's Twisting Trails," author John Burton recounts his experiences through the Great Depression, as a Wake Island contractor and survivor and a prisoner of the Japanese in WWII. Burton is a member of the LDS Church, or Mormon to the rest of us. His experiences are not unique, in fact, a recent book "Rescued By Mao," by William Taylor ( Silverleaf Press, 2007) recounts a similar adventure, albeit a much longer book.
   Burton's writing style is emblematic of the WWII recollections that were published in the 35 to 40 years following the war, it's not particularly exciting, but reveals the torment and anguish suffered by captives of the Imperial Japanese military.
   This is an exceptionally short read and for Wake Island scholars a necessary, if not always accurate account of the 1941 Japanese siege on the island garrison. Factual errors aside, "Traveling Life's Twisting Trails" provides an interesting account of one man's perception of the WWII and POW experience.
   REVIEW EVERY BOOK YOU READ, AS A CONSUMER OF LITERATURE, YOUR OPINIONS MATTER.

No comments about Shipwrecked! the True Adventure of a Japanese Boy.

2 comments about The American Japanese.

1. The story of Akira Toki was familiar to me--I have known people who were incarcerated in the Japanese internment camps in Arizona. They too had left the camps to farm in the Midwest--and faced similar hardships. Toki's upbeat attitude, heroism and success in the face of hardship is a great tale and a great testament to his fortitude. If you liked "Farewell to Manzanar", you will enjoy reading "The American Japanese."



2. Arthur Rathburn's short oral history of Akira Toki is an excellent study of America's treatment of AJA (a term used during World War Two for "Americans of Japanese Ancestory.")
   This is a story rich in tales of racial tolerance, racial intolerance, and American Patriotism. One gets a fresh and interesting view of life in America for American born and raised persons of Japanese Ancestory. It is not just a tale of regret or of bitterness. but a good over view of many of the complicated aspects of the subject. When one reads the book there is a definate desire to want to meet this true American, Akira Toki.

No comments about Biography Of Princess Yasha 2 And Zhu Fang Of The Chapter - Rocket City Blues ( Non-sporran) Japanese Language Book.

No comments about Japanese Biographies: Life Histories, Life Cycles, Life Stages.: An article from: Pacific Affairs.

No comments about Yukio Mishima - A Critical Biography Japanese Language Book.

2 comments about Contemporary Japanese Architects (Big Series : Architecture and Design).

1. Excellent and beautiful book. Fascinating design elements and solutions. Written in English, French and German simultaneously. Gorgeous, highest resolution, photographic reproductions. Every art or architecture library should include it.



2. All the volumes of "contemporary architects" books, i know 6 of them, includes lots of photos that can be seen in any of architectural magazines. But there must be something more. In fact it is cheap to buy, but just in Amazon.com i think. In Turkey it is sold in cash and i don't want to pay so much money for a little idea.