"A factual story of disrupted lives during wartime, it raises deep, timeless questions about loyalty to one's country and family....with a novelist's sense of pacing and pulsing, at times lyrical, language, Rotner Sakamoto weaves a seamless mosaic of historical research and personal accounts....Throughout the book, the narrative is impartial yet deeply moving, a genuine empathy marking both the Fukuharas and the author....Most people agree that truth is stranger than fiction. But this astonishing history, a milestone in cultural studies, shows that life can be more complex than common notions of national allegiance."