AustLit

'Joy Chambers' historical novel is an epic and dramatic story set in the Phillipines during the Second World War. It is a tangled story of two couples in love and war. In Hong Kong, before her marriage to John Drayton, Lexine has a night of passion with an American officer, which results in the birth of a baby boy. Letting her husband believe their son is his child, they him bring up together until the war interrupts their lives. Leaving home on a boat in a desperate attempt to escape the Japanese, Lexine and her family are shipwrecked. Believing she is the only survivor, she is distraught about the loss of her family. She sets up home in the Philipines and agrees to look after two orphaned children. Desperately trying to flee from the Japanese, she encounters the American officer once again and her past comes back to haunt her. Lexine's best friend, Kathleen also survives the shipwreck and is taken in by a vicious and cruel Japanese general. Even though she is a vulnerable prisoner of war, he strangely never leases his violence on her. The mysterious tangles between the characters is played out in dramatic and momentous style, resulting in a powerful conclusion.' Source: Libraries Australia.