Customer Reviews
Compelling Japanese viewpoint of Pacific War and Korean Occupation 
2008-01-24
A detailed and compelling memoir. Eleven-year-old Yoko and her family must move from Naman, North Korea, at the end of World War II and the end of the Japanese Occupation of Korea. The father is imprisoned, son is separated, mother is ill, and she and two daughters take a journey of peril, separation, poverty and hunger to be repatriated to Japan. Once there, they live in a bomb ruin and attempt to go to school (befriended by the janitor who saves her paper and pencil stubs) while mother searches for son and husband. Shelved in Young Adult, but a compelling, informative read for adults.
Dangerous book to immatures.. 
2008-01-23
As I'm Korean, I will explain this book to westerns who especially dumbass for knowledge of far-east nation. This book's story is like, "A young daugher of Nazi family,escaping from their occupied land at the end of the war." Um..it helped for your common knowledge?
"Koreans raped and attacked Japanese during this period?" = "Jews raped and attacked Germans during WorldWar2 ?"- do you guys is this make any sense?
And even worse, bamboo forest in "Ham-kyoung-buk-do"?(State in North Korea where is so cold that bamboo tree cannot grow). Second,"Korean Communist Army"? this army established in 1948 August 8. Three years after independence from japan. It doesn't make any sense that sodiers who even wearing uniform of the army existed in story took place.
The hole book is filled with nonsense.
Yoko is "harmer"'s daugher NOT "victim"'s daugher. The harmer that raped thousands of daughers of Korea, The harmer that killed millions of people in Asia, The harmer that forced Koreans to don't speak their own alphabet and language, the harmer that forced Koreans to worship and visit Japanese shrine(who do not follow-they killed) ,the harmer that KILLED and IMPRISONED Korean protestors who want INDEPENDANCE....and so on..(I can't tell you guys all because there are so many).
The last, "harmer" who do not regret their fault in the past and MAKE KOREANS VICTIMS TO A HARMERS.........and teach....distorted history..
this book may impress many kids by fanciful story, but the truth must be declare.
I feel very rage and anger about this book, and sorry for my grandparents WHO ARE STILL LIVING IN HIS/HER OLD AGES, AND STILL TELLING ME ABOUT THEIR REAL EXPERIENCES THAT TIME EVEN NOW.....
and I feel sorry not only my grandparents, all grannies who are still living or dead in Korea, themselves again trampled by one crazy old japanese woman.
Based on her old memory, some are not corrent, though. 
2007-09-07
Her writing is both attractive and shocking even to adults. Even though there are diputes regarding distorting the historical fact, her story is touching and also good.
One thing I feel sympathy is that the setting she described is far from truth. Were it not for the odd setting, this story could be more attractive even in Asians who had had terrible memories toward Japanese army during the World War II.
Due to the severe weather, bamboo has not been growing up in northern part in Korea. Besides, Korea was divided into North and South Korea in 1948. Since the setting is 1945, Japanese ruled in Korea, which means there were no organized communist army at that time in northern part in Korea.
Despite those flaws, this book is worth for discussions among people especially who are aware of Asian history.
Please read this book from the beginning to the end carefully. 
2007-08-20
I purchased this book after I had heard an argue over this book between Koreans and this author. Koreans said this book is showing fabricated history, and this author said it is the true story. Koreans even kicked this book out of libraries in the U. S. The author said sorry for misunderstanding.
I have parents, who are the same age with this author. To tell you the truth, this book is the part of true history.
My parents, one is from North Korea and the other is from South Korea. My parents had told me so many times about WWII and Korean war, how they survived. That is the reason why I am saying this book is the real history. Koreans, please read this book carefully from the beginning to the end. This author was appreciating to Koreans, who helped her big brother to escape from North Korea. The rape incidents are true. My parents told me that there were so many mad Koreans to try to revenge Japanese. In North Korea, there were Russian soldiers raping any age Korean women. In South Korea, it was chaos. Yes, it is true that Japanese took Korean girls to sexually serve Japanese soldiers. However, because of that reason,after WWII, a few mad Koreans tried to kill Japanese, who were in Korea. In Japan, a few mad Japanese tried to kill Koreans, who were in Japan, too. Please, peple. This it the real tragic story behind war. There are innocent people. Even though the country started the war, still there are so many other nice people behind of this bad decision.
Back in before 1945, there were a lot of Japanese and Koreans, who leanred each other's languages. But also, there were some people, who only knew how to speak the other language. One of my mom's friend, who had been in Japan before 1945, came back to Korea after WWII ended, but did not know how to speak Korean. She was misunderstood as a Japanese to Koreans. She and her family were almost beaten to dead by Koreans.
Hatred is making people to be blind. There are no perfect people. Even nice people can make mistakes.
Please no more fighting... It does not help anything.
To know each other, to understand each other, please read this book carefully. And please do not judge anyone because some of those bad people's mistakes.
Trash 2007-05-28
Don't waste your time on this book. It's full of lies and distorts the truth. The japanese still refuse to apologize for their horrific war crimes/crimes against humanity.
Excellent Book 2007-04-27
Though Japanese, eleven-year-old Yoko has lived with her family in northern Korea near the border with China all her life. But when the Second World War comes to an end, Japanese on the Korean peninsula are suddenly in terrible danger; the Korean people want control of their homeland and they want to punish the Japanese, who have occupied their nation for many years. Yoko, her mother and sister are forced to flee from their beautiful house with its peaceful bamboo grove. Their journey is terrifying -- and remarkable. It's a true story of courage and survival.
I am simply confused by these comments by "kid's review" and "a reader" 2007-04-21
This might be a "well written" book, but it is completely distorting the truth about the Japanese WW2 aggressions and atrocies. It makes as if atrocies were committed by the victims rather than the aggressor. If you knew even a bit of history, you would have some misgivings and the second thoughts about why the author wrote this book and why she is trying so hard for this book to be adopted by the elementary schools around the U.S. Depiction of mindless rapes and atrocies committed by the Koreans and Russians in this book could have happened, however what does she say about those close to half million comfort girls and women who were forcefully removed from their homes and brutally raped by Japanese soliders day after day and had to live as sex slaves for the duration of the war. Most of these women were never compensated for the crimes committed by Japanese government and people to this day. On top of that, Japanese government continually denies the atrocities by their soliders and civilians during the war (although it's partially due to lawsuits which may result from their admissions). You might say that this is a story about a Japanese girl and writing her memoir about WW2 although I seriously question whether this book is suitable for the elementary school kids considering the level of violence depicted in this book.
If Anne Frank were a German and she were still alive to this day and if she wrote about the mindless rapes committed by Jewish resistance fighters and Jewish American soliders after WW2 and no mention was made about the Holocaust during WW2. Wouldn't you think that is a DISTORTION of history?
If they were going to adopt this book as the textbook for the elementary school kids, they should at least adopt another book written by a Chinese or Korean author talking about a girl who was amidst of Nanking Massacre or a girl kidnapped by Japanese soldiers during WW2 to serve as sex slaves. That should give a balanced view of what really happened during WW2 and should mitigate unfounded stereotypes about certain ethnicities or racial groups.
And who are these "kid's review" and "a reader"? They are writing unanimous praise of this book. Somehow, the same person is writing two dozen reviews and trying to promote this book. Do you smell something fishy here?
incredible fabrications of history 2007-03-31
Does she know anything about Japan's wartime history? Just google "Unit 731," the place where her own daddy probably worked at. Is it a pure coincidence that her daddy lived in the area where these despicable, inhuman experiments took place?
A misleading book!!! 2007-01-23
This is a bad fiction based entirely on fabricated history. The book is so biased and inundated with historical inaccuracies that even the publishers in Japan refuse to publish this book in Japanese.
The bottom line is that the author was a daughter of a war criminal, high Japenese official stationed at a northern Korean province during the Japanese occupation of Korea, and had led a comfortable life at the expense of the suffering of the Korean people until she and her family got kicked out of Korea at the end of the WWII. She's a disgruntled former beneficiary of the Japanese imperialism and this book is a poor attempt to mislead the public and further her hidden agenda.
It's not too hard to google this book and find many inaccuracies claimed by the author. It is especially appalling that this book is a children's novel aimed at American children who are not familiar with what Japanese imperialism did to other Asians during the first half of the last century. If you are buying books for your children or students, stay clear of this one, it will give your children one bad history lesson.
akin to a well written pro-Nazi narrative 2007-01-17
This book is a great read of a fictionalized account of Yoko Watkin's story. There are no bamboos in NK. There were no communist soldiers when Yoko's family left for Japan. And Japanese retreat occurred under heavy military protection. But don't be fooled by the well-written narrative.
This book is akin to an escape narrative of an SS officer's family running away from Birkenow Auschwitz concentration camp while the heroin daughter of the Nazi officer is running away from cruel and dangerous Jews freed from concentration camps and Poles. Such a narrative is morally irresponsible and disgusting material to force upon innocent children.
Stay away from this book if you value humanity and decency.
