Broken Jewel

Until I read Broken Jewel, I thought I knew the shape and texture of internee or prison camp stories, but I was wrong. From the first page, this story takes your heart hostage and doesn't release it until the very end. It is certainly true that everyone has a story, but David L. Robbins releases those stories in a way that captures your attention and grips your emotions. Why should you care about the civilian internees in the Los Banos camp in the Philippines during 1944 and 1945? Because they were real. Because they were in peril of being senselessly killed during the collapse of the Japanese defense of the Philippines. Because there was a historic rescue mission. Yes to all of these, but also because a very talented story teller has seized the key elements and told the story in an unforgettable way. One aspect of the story that has been neglected in most fictional accounts of World War II revolves around one of the central characters, a Filipino comfort woman. Her story, as well as the story of the internees is as gripping as it is heartbreaking. This is easily the best of David L. Robbins' books so far.

(I am not "Virginia Grandma," but her husband.) David Robbins' Broken Jewel is a fast-paced, gripping tale of survival in the most brutal of circumstances, a Japanese internment camp in the Philippine Islands after the tide had turned against Japan in the war in the Pacific. It is also a tender story of the unusual love between a 19-year-old American internee and a young Filipina abducted by the Japanese from her home in Manila and abused as a sex slave to the Japanese army. The two of them and his father take part in a race against time to bring about a daring rescue mission by the U.S. 11th Airborne Division to save the 2,100 prisoners in the camp from impending massacre by the Japanese. While the details of the story are fiction, the broad outline and the setting are based on fact, on the events leading up to and surrounding the raid on the Los Banos internment camp on February 23, 1945 by elements of the 11th Airborne and heroic Filipino guerrillas in the area. Los Banos was thirty miles behind Japanese lines, and the rescue involved a coordinated local and airborne assault and an amphibious rescue. Robbins' research is meticulous, and he has conveyed the flavor of the events with power and grace. As a survivor of the camp who was rescued that morning, I can attest that Robbins' account closely mirrors the stories I grew up listening to my parents and their friends tell. For anyone interested in the war in the Pacific, this is a can't-miss read.

Very well done! David L Robbins re-visits the Japanese occupation of the Philippines and how the internees and Filipinos fared. His story telling makes the memories of our parents, who went through the hardships and terrors of the occupation be more vivid to the next generation. This book definitely goes on the list of presents for parents of friends and families who survived the war.

I ussually don't like books set during WWII or WWI but I really enjoyed this story. It had me on the edge of my seat and I read it in three days. Great characters and the author does a fantastic job of telling the story.

There have been many books and films, as well as the wonderful television program on the rescue of the prisoners of war at Cabanatuan, covering the trials and suffering of those armed forces and civilians held by the Japanese Army, on the Philippine Islands during World War II. This is one more book on the subject, but I think this one deserves to be read. Mr. Robbins takes a slightly different tack and covers a subject which hasn't been reported on widely. Besides telling the story of the civilian internees, he shows a picture of the life of the "comfort women" who were put into service as sex slaves to the invading army. The "glamorized" picture of the lives of these women as shown in past films was not the norm. Mr. Robbins gives us a look at the reality of the lives of these women and they deserve to have it told. Besides describing this subject, Mr. Robbins has given us another exciting adventure in telling the story of the end of the camp at Los Banos. He tells of the hardship and suffering brought about by the combination of a weak commandant and an arrogant cruel Sargeant of the guards, who deals out ration cuts and punishments on whims. Mr. Robbins' scholarship and research are excellent. This is my first David Robbins' book but he reminds me, very much, of the work of the Shaaras and Robert Harris. He takes the factual history and winds it in with a fascinating, exciting story. Mr. Robbins even takes two or three of the actual people to create his characters. As a History major, one of the things I loved about this book was that there is a set of annotations at the end of the book which explains, chapter by chapter, how the real story rolled out and how the writer incorporated it into his story. I am looking forward to reading more of Mr. Robbins' books, and I highly recommend that anyone interested in this time in our history or even someone who wants to read a really good adventure story, read this book as soon as possible.