End of Summer

I was privileged to write the Foreword to this novel by Dan Shanahan. Please check this out on Amazon.

Foreword

End of Summer captures the essence of what happened after Pearl Harbor:

                              Under the rising sun,

                              the enemy came,

                              wearing my face.

End of Summer returned me, not to the fact that we were treated like the enemy, but to three basic Japanese teachings I  grew up with :  Shikata ga nai ( it can’t be helped, it is what it is), Gaman ( to endure the unbearable with patience and dignity) and Bachi  ( Divine punishment or Karma)

Two cultures meet on American soil, immigrants from Germany and Japan, to live  the American dream.As the story unfolds, a piece of farmland, taken from the Japanese when they are sent to an internment camp, becomes more than property – and the consequence of a decision made by both the German and Japanese extend into their future generations.

The story is told behind a silk fan, the quiet and dignified undercurrents and loud silences, half concealed, become a pair of threads from both cultures that weave together throughout the story. As with others of Dan Shanahan’s works, there is that large twisting gasp at the end . . . so the reader is advised not to skip to the ending. You need to experience this gasp exactly where it appears.  The beautiful use of language and the well-developed characters from two cultures will endure long after you read the last word.

Frances H Kakugawa

Author of Echoes of Kapoho and Dangerous Woman: Poetry for the Ageless