So Far from the Bamboo Grove

What caused me to review this specific book was an article in the Japan Times on-line site, dated Jan. 18, 2007, and entitled Book Claims Koreans Raped Japanese. My review of that article is in my current events section on atrocities.

I wanted to see if what the people were objecting to was really there. The book is about Yuko's mother and older sister fleeing from North Korea, trying to get to the south and away from the Korean Communists.

Very early in the book Yuko and the others are treated almost savagely by Japanese soldiers, not Koreans. They flee to the South and go through a series of very grim experiences, managing finally to get to a place where they are able to get a boat back to Japan.

Things don't get any better for Yuko and her sister, though, when their mother dies. Their brother is still missing in Korea, and their father is missing in Manchuria.

The events in the book that take place during the time they are fleeing to the south do include Koreans raping some Japanese. They also include Koreans murdering Japanese, and the events are quite believable, considering how the Koreans felt about the Japanese.

There is also a short historical section at the end of the book which clearly describes Japan's takeover of Korea and how the people felt, so the book is not hiding Japan's guilt in taking over Korea. It is simply a book about some Japanese fleeing and the experiences they went through; regardless of what had happened in the past, raping women and girls is not an acceptable form of behavior for anyone, period.

The book itself is well written and gripping. Grim, but gripping.

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