"Without demonizing either the Americans or the Japanese, Sakamoto makes clear the cost of this war for both sides. Scrupulously sticking to her sources, she maintains a discreet distance from the story. By stepping away from high drama, and refraining from exaggeration, she allows the small shocks and surprises, both good and bad, of these lives to emerge naturally. In doing so, she finds a new angle on a war about which it might have seemed there was little fresh to say."