End of the Beginning

Excellent conclusion to his "what if" of Hawaii invaded after Pearl Harbor sneak attack I am a big Turtledove fan, having read just about every book he has published, and this sequel is another jewel in his writing crown. I found myself turning each page in anticipation of what would happen next. The same characters that you loved from "Days of Infamy" are back and each takes a different road to a perhaps inevitable conclusion. Yes, Turtledove does tend to repeat himself at times. A perfect example being Joe Crosetti's repeated discussions of the landing process on a carrier and his intentions to "obey the wigwag flag man no matter what", but it is a small price to pay for what reads as a great examination of Americas attempt to re-capture the lost Hawaiian islands after the Japanese invaded after attacking Pearl Harbor. The ending is somewhat predictable and if you do not see the outcome for Jiro ( the Elder Japanese Fisherman) coming from a mile away you should not call yourself a history buff. Overall, a great book that kept my interest and really showed a more detailed glimpse of the characters from the first book. A must get book! Sam Hendricks, author of "Fantasy Football Guidebook: Your Comprehensive Guide to Playing Fantasy Football".

End of the Beginning (2005) is the second novel in the Pacific War series, following Days of Infamy. In the previous novel, the US sent B-25s against the Japanese on Hawaii, but to little effect. The US also sent a three carrier task force and the Japanese sunk or disabled all the carriers. Later the Japanese installed a puppet government on the islands with Stanley Owana Laanui as king. In this novel, the Japanese on Hawaii are short of oil and American submarines are preying on their supply lines. Although sufficient fuel is available to keep patrol planes and ships on station around the islands, civilian supplies are restricted to a few buses serving the island of Oahu. Even the sampans are using sails to travel to and from the fishing waters. Most of the haoles on Hawaii are just barely surviving. Since a prisoner in his squad had escaped, Jim Peterson is now digging a useless tunnel to nowhere; he and his fellow POWs are being worked to death as an alternative to the firing squad. Fletch Armitage and other American POWs are performing hard manual labor, preparing gun positions and other fortifications (Japan had not signed the Geneva Convention); they are also being underfed, but not as severely as the death squads. Jane Armitage is slowly starving on a diet that is not quite enough, even though she is working hard in her garden. Oscar van der Kirk is catching fish from his sail board and trading some of them for other food supplies; he even has time to surf. Susie Higgens, Oscar's live-in, is getting by OK with her secretarial job and Oscar's fish. Jiro Takahashi and his sons are doing very well by catching fish from the Oshima Maru, their sampan, and taking them back to Oahu; although the Japanese Army takes most of the catch for their own use, some portion is left to the fishermen to eat or trade. Ken Takahashi is giving some fish to Mrs. Sundberg and thereby avoiding any complaints about his dates with Elsie. The Japanese soldiers are getting plenty of rice, but little else. Their officers are eating better than the common soldiers and the senior officers are occasionally enjoying most of the traditional Japanese foods. Nevertheless, good sake is very hard to obtain. Back in the states, life goes on much as it has in the past. However, gas is rationed and most traffic is painted army drab or navy gray. Many more men are wearing uniforms now and the Marine Corps has opened a new post, Camp Pendleton, to accommodate the expected influx of trainees. Platoon Sergeant Lester Dillion and his friend Dutch Wenzel are amazed at the attitudes of some of these trainees. Joe Crosetti is still learning how to fly a plane at the Pensacola Naval Air Station, but he has graduated from Stearman trainers to the Texan. He is still having trouble with navigation, but he is gradually getting better. His friend Orson Sharp continues to be about a week ahead of him in the training. The Navy is building more aircraft carriers, but a

I recently reviewed Days of Infamy: A Novel of Alternate History and while I thoroughly enjoyed the book, I complained that author Harry Turtledove perhaps understated the brutality of the Japanese during World War II. End of the Beginning picks up where Days of Infamy left off, and this time, I think the true horror of living in a Japanese occupied territory during World War II is clearly illustrated. Perhaps it is just me, but I am more horrified by violent rape than I am by death. Death can be horrible, but with death, the horror ends. In End of the Beginning, some of the characters that I had learned to identify with and had grown fond of find themselves in increasingly desperate straights. Hawaii's civilians are slowly starving. U.S. prisoners of war are on a program of accelerated slow death. Their hunger is punctuated by random beatings and grueling manual labor. Fletcher "Fletch" Armitage, a U.S. POW, is a walking skeleton and his wife Jane, who had been in the process of divorcing him when the war began, is forced to work in a Japanese "comfort house" as a sex slave. She is beaten and forced to satisfy numerous Japanese daily. The writer does an excellent job of bringing home the shame and horror of being forced to surrender your body repeatedly to other humans who do not perceive you as human but as an object to be used. This is not a book for children. I felt queasy reading certain passages, and I am perhaps one of the most jaded Americans I know. Despite or perhaps because of the discomfort I felt as the stories of characters I had come to care about unfolded and took turns for the worse, this book had me hypnotized throughout. It was better than Days of Infamy mostly because I was rooting for America to retake Hawaii the whole time. I had to wait to read End of the Beginning for this to happen. Although the Japanese are portrayed as brutal (and they were, historically speaking), Turtledove also portrays some of his Japanese characters as likeable men dedicated to their duty. Commander Genda, who is the engineer of the invasion and Admiral Yamamoto's protege, has an affair with the recently crowned Queen of Hawaii but he is a likable, intelligent man who is not brutal by nature and is simply doing his best to serve his nation. End of the Beginning managed to to suck me through its 440 pages in two days and left me wanting to hear more of the story. My own war here in Iraq seems boring by comparison to the scope and scale of events in World War II, and Turtledove's imagined land invasion of Hawaii is not that far off what might have happened. A highly worthwhile read for history buffs, action fans, romance lovers and adventure aficionados.

In this second work of an alternate history in which the Japanese invaded Hawaii after their sneak attack, Turtledove shows his brilliance yet again. He manages to take an alternate view of things, ask "what if it happened this way?" and proceed from their in a logical and, most importantly, an interesting manner. He does well at this in all his works but this one is especially well done. The situation involves a Japanese occupation of Hawaii. The US wants it back and has failed once already to take it. Caught in the middle are the POWs, the native and the occasional tourist who were trapped there on December 7th. This can be read as a military adventure and it does well as such but the best parts are the characterizations. The bad guys sometimes have some redeeming qualities. The good guys often have flagrant flaws and nothing is as simple as it seems. Especially telling is his account of two US born citizens of Hawaii whose father and mother are Japanese immigrants. Dad is loyal to the emperor; the kids are loyal to Uncle Sam and nobody really trusts them. Its an exciting read. It is also a thought provoking one.

Following the Pearl Harbor attack, the Japanese invade and conquer Hawaii (see DAYS OF INFAMY). The United States counter assault fails as the Japanese Zero controls the skies. Japan quickly installs a ruthless government that subjects the islands to a harsh occupation though they bring back the royals to allegedly rule (under their thumb). American POWs are worked to death without a second thought and the women are turned into prostitutes for the conquerors amusement. Japanese-Americans living on the islands are divided. While those born in Japan having a taste of American racism support and help their native country, their children want the return of the United States and freedom. The native Hawaiians see little difference between the two sets of conquerors except that the Japanese are overtly de facto abusive while the Americans were de jure discriminatory. Still most residents regardless of ethnicity just try to survive the food shortages while expecting the battle to return as the embarrassment of the defeat has the White House pumping up the military-industrial complex to win the War in the Pacific. This is a terrific alternate historical thriller that leaves no prisoners as the audience obtains a taste of racial relationships that leave nothing to the imagination. Harry Turtledove is at his best with the action-packed tale yet the myriad of perspectives (somewhat difficult to follow so expect several days up to a week to read) provide the individual and group dynamics. What if novels rarely reach this pinnacle as the epic saga and the character specific blend into a fabulous alternate WW II drama. Harriet Klausner