Showing posts with label Japanese. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Japanese. Show all posts

Wednesday, June 28, 2023

Beneath a Peaceful Moon by Debby Lee


Takes place during WW2 after Japan attacked. Two native Americans from different parts of America meet on base and beautifully fall for each other before getting shipped out. They're both doing undercover work, but can't tell each other. They don't even realize how close to each other they are, yet they have a special bond as though God orchestrated it. Faith is the underlining thread that keeps them strong through it all. Hopeful, heart wrenching, tense. Hard to put down. The story keeps you fully engaged, lots of tension with the dangers they both go through and knowing how close they are to each other during the section of the war with the Japanese, on a jungle island. You have to know what happens! It almost lost me towards the end when it's so obviously spread out with cliffhanger after cliffhanger, but because it's so real it deserves five stars. You want another chapter to see it through with the other characters that they've met along the way, so it ends a bit abruptly.

I received this book free from the author, publisher and CelebrateLit book review bloggers program. I was not required to write a positive review. The opinions I have expressed are my own.

#BeneathAPeacefulMoon #DebbyLee #BooksYouCanFeelGoodAbout #FiveStarNovel #CelebrateLit

About the Book

Book: Beneath a Peaceful Moon

Author: Debby Lee

Genre: Christian Historical Fiction

Release date: June, 2023

Mary’s Language Skills Could Help End the War in the Pacific
Full of intrigue, adventure, and romance, this series celebrates the unsung heroes—the heroines of WWII.

Mary Wishram is desperate to hang on to her few loved ones, a brother fighting in the South Pacific and Japanese friends in a relocation camp. Determined to end the war by any means necessary, she is willing to use her language skills as Yakama tribe member to become a spy and face any danger to bring them all home safe.

John Painted Horse struggles with the loss of his father who died in WWI for a country that didn’t consider him a United States citizen, much less give him the right to vote. He is desperate to bring long overdue recognition and honor to his people, no matter the cost.

Can they heal from their past traumas and find a peace, love, and a deeper relationship with God, before it’s too late? 

Click here to get your copy! 

About the Author

Debby Lee was raised in the cozy little town of Toledo, Washington. She has been writing since she was a small child, and has written several novels, but never forgets home. The Northwest Christian Writers Association and Romance Writers of America are two organizations that Debby enjoys being a part of. As a self professed nature lover, and an avid listener of 1960’s folk music, Debby can’t help but feel like a hippie child who wasn’t born soon enough to attend Woodstock. She wishes she could run barefoot all year long, but often does anyway in the grass and on the beaches in her hamlet that is the cold and rainy southwest Washington. During football season, Debby cheers on the Seattle Seahawks along with legions of other devoted fans. She’s also filled with wanderlust and dreams of visiting Denmark, Italy, and Morocco someday.  Debby loves connecting with her readers through her website at www.booksbydebbylee.com

More from Debby

MY ATTEMPT AT MEATHOD WRITING

It was a warm, sunny September morning on my uncle’s farm, where I used an entrenching tool to dig my foxhole. A gentle breeze blew as I dug, and cooled my sweat-streaked forehead. The little shovel, with a handle roughly three feet long, did a fair job of breaking the dirt beneath my feet. Scoopful by scoopful, I managed to dig a hole about two feet deep, six feet long, and three feet wide. 

I stood over this gaping pit that looked more like a grave. This was where I intended to sleep when darkness fell. I wondered, asked myself, “Will I make it through the night?” 

My husband and I walked the perimeter of my uncle’s property. We noticed evidence of coyotes not more than one-hundred yards from my foxhole. Though my husband agreed to sleep in his truck not far from me, with a loaded pistol at the ready, we were still nervous about my sleeping arrangements. A few relatives laughed at my idea. I’m sure they thought I wouldn’t last more than a few hours out there that night. 

I found a bucket old tin cans and a roll of string. I used my entrenching tool as a hammer and pounded holes in the cans and then strung a trip wire. Surely this would scare away any curious predators. I hoped. 

My husband did tell me, “If you hear wolves or coyotes howling, get in the truck!” 

By this time it was late in the evening and I was starving. In an attempt to stay in character, I reached for an MRE. That’s Meals Ready to Eat, today’s equivalent to K rations and C rations. I never thought I’d be hungry enough to suck cold mashed potatoes from a plastic pouch. 

I went to bed that night clutching my entrenching tool, ready to fight off any critters who ventured too close. Sleep didn’t come easy that night. The ground was hard, uneven, and cold, bone-chilling cold. I shivered and shivered in a futile effort to keep warm. 

The things that ran through my mind. I gazed at the inky, black sky and located the North Star. I thought of runaway slaves. How cold and terribly frightened they had to have been. And how brave and courageous, too. 

Later, I realized my trip wire was enough to alert me to coyotes, but not snakes or rats. Was I strong enough, mentally, physically, to beat off a hoard of rats? A pack of hungry coyotes, if they broke through my tripwire? 

Honestly, I was terrified. Not necessarily of falling to sleep, but falling to sleep and being jolted awake having to fight for my safety. I meditated on scriptures and continuously whispered, “If I can just make it until daylight.” 

I don’t think I slept more than three hours that night, an hour here, another there. The sun lightened the gray sky. I climbed from my foxhole, my back and muscles were stiff and sore, but I was thankful to see the sun. 

I was thankful for so much more. My night in a foxhole was ludicrously luxurious compared to those brave soldiers who fought during WWII and the wars since then. At least I didn’t have to contend with bombs or grenades raining down on me. 

I can’t imagine going to bed night after night, wondering if bombs, grenades, or gunfire would pierce the air, wondering if my buddies and I would be shot or blown to bits, wondering if I’d live to see sunrise. My respect for soldiers grew a thousand-fold that night. 

I’ve visited my uncle’s farm several times since then. I always gaze across the partially wooded forty acres and I remember that night. And remember the sacrifices our soldiers made for me, for democracy, and for freedom.

Blog Stops

Giveaway

To celebrate her tour, Debby is giving away the grand prize package of a print copy of the book and a $25 Amazon eGift Card!!

Be sure to comment on the blog stops for nine extra entries into the giveaway! Click the link below to enter.

https://promosimple.com/ps/2678d/beneath-a-peaceful-moon-celebration-tour-giveaway


My reviews

Tuesday, November 3, 2020

Things We Didn't Say by Amy Lynn Green


Brilliant format.
The whole book is told in the format of letters written. Set after the war with both Germany and Japan. A brilliant yet snotty young girl Jo is in college, finally escaping her small home town, when during the war she is pretty much forced to return home and act as an interpreter at a POW camp. Her best friend is a Japanese American guy who is a teacher of language for interred young men preparing to go overseas. The story opens with Jo being charged with treason. She fought going back home and putting her dreams on hold but her scholarship sponsor forces the issue. 
It was uncomfortable at first reading a story in this format, but it didn't take long to find it brilliant. There is so much you learn about each of the people in the letters and you can read between the lines. Friends from collage, friends from home, German prisoners, people from the small community. All weave the story. Expertly. With family of German heritage I always wondered how they felt as Americans here during the war, what it was like with German POW camps nearby, how they were treated in this small town. This story gives you a possible glimpse. A sleepy small town becomes full of hostility, examples of the humanity of the prisoners soften the opinions of many. Hard to put down!
#ThingsWeDidntSay #NetGalley
I received this book free from the publisher and NetGalley book review bloggers program. I was not required to write a positive review. The opinions I have expressed are my own.

My Reviews

Friday, July 5, 2019

The Last Year of the War by Susan Meissner

https://www.amazon.com/Last-Year-War-Susan-Meissner-ebook/dp/B07DZW5X3K/ref=sr_1_1?keywords=the+last+year+of+the+war&qid=1562341703&s=gateway&sr=8-1https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/the-last-year-of-the-war-susan-meissner/1128957927?ean=9780451492159#/https://www.powells.com/book/-9780451492159https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/40530049-the-last-year-of-the-war?from_search=true

"We do not become different people as we age; we just add layers of experience onto who we already are."

Deeply interesting story of a young girl of German descent who is sent with her family to an internment camp in Texas when WW2 starts. She meets a Japanese girl there who is the same age, and it's fascinating to learn about them both. They are now both many years older, having lived separate lives, not connecting again until now. Elise recounts her life as it unfolded, in incredible detail.

More than eleven thousand German American and German Latin American legal residents and citizens were interned during World War II at the camp in Crystal City, Texas, and in other similar detention facilities. They were encouraged and sometimes forced to repatriate to their country - used in exchange for Americans. The thing is though, people like Elise were born here and Americans too, their parents living as Americans, but it didn't matter that they were innocent of any crime. I can identify a little bit, as my Grandmother's parents came over from Belgium in 1905, but that was well before WW1. My Grandmother was born here. I'm sure their German heritage and accents stood out. This story has very real accounts of bombing in Germany and what it was like to live there even if you didn't agree with what Hitler did and didn't want to be there. Fabulous read, gently woven with present day.

". . . the past is nothing you can make friends or enemies of. It just is what it is. Or was. It is this day you are living right now, this very day, that is yours to make of it what you will. So make it beautiful, if you can."

Disclosure of Material Connection: I received this book free from the publisher and NetGalley book review bloggers program. I was not required to write a positive review. The opinions I have expressed are my own. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255 “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”
#TheLastYearOfTheWar #NetGalley #BooksYouCanFeelGoodAbout #SusanMeissner

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