Author Description

Eric Lomax was a lonely boy in Scotland in the 1930s, a devoted railway enthusiast - a spotter of trains in the glorious final age of steam, when engines were really worth looking at. In 1941 he was sent to Malaya as a member of the Royal Corps of Signals. Taken prisoner after the fall of Singapore, he was put to work on the infamous Burma-Siam railway, which cost the lives of 250,000 men. There he helped to build an illicit radio, so that the prisoners could follow the news of the war. The discovery of the radio by the Japanese brought on two years of dreadful torture, starvation, and distress. Among his tormenters was a young English-speaking Japanese man attached to the secret police. Lomax never forgot his voice or his face. He spent half a century after the war internalizing and alone with his experiences; there was no one with whom he could share them. Late in life, Lomax learned how to believe in the possibility of hope. By a miracle of coincidence he discovered that his Japanese interrogator was alive, and found out where he was. This unforgettable book describes a life saved from final bitterness by an extraordinary will to remember and forgive.