A Novel.
A enthralling, riveting, powerful epic about the resilience of the human spirit that combines a wrenching brutal wartime narrative with magical realism and stories. It's the kind of book that will make you sob with despair and your heart soar with hope!
Inspired by the real life experience of the author's father who was a young boy in the Philippines during World War II, Tess Urize Holthe's story begins during the final week of the ferocious Japanese-American battle for possession of the Philippines.
Here, we listen to three distinct narrators who reveal the struggle to survive in a small community outside Manila, where the streets are littered with dead bodies and the threat of capture by Japanese soldiers lurks around every corner.
Huddling together in a squalid cellar is a group of Filipino families. As the war rages outside, tales of magical realism and superstition unfold in the cellar - stories that give comfort and help each family member to endure the atrocities and find hope in the midst of chaos.