Midnight in Broad Daylight: A Japanese American Family Caught Between Two Worlds Hardcover – Deckle Edge, January 5, 2016 by Pamela Rotner Sakamoto (Harper)

One heck of a story, worth reading twice!

Harry Fukuhara was born in Seattle, Washington in 1921 and through unlikely twists of fate ended up a priceless interpreter/translator for the MIS (Military Intelligence Service) during WWII. The saga of his family is told with meticulous research and detail by Pamela Rotner Sakamoto.

Against his will, Harry was taken by his mother to Japan with his siblings after his father died. After securing a promise that he could return if he graduated from high school there, he applied himself and finally did return, but to an America that was not welcoming to him in 1938. The sojourn in Japan, however, had secured him a solid education in that arcane language and a deep understanding of the vocabulary of war because his high school had been militarized. This was to prove invaluable when he volunteered for the Army.

Each member of his family went through his/her own struggle to survive, some of them living through the horrors of the atomic bombing of Hiroshima. Aside from Harry's own incredible story, I was surprised to learn so much about the life and times of Nisei (second gen Japanese-Americans) in Japan as well as on the West Coast. Even those who are familiar with the incarceration of Japanese-Americans in the camps following America's declaration of war may find much of this story new to them. I didn't realize that for Nisei who happened to be in Japan pre-war, life was difficult as they were looked upon with hostility which got even worse once war started. The same applied on the West Coast where they were subject to discrimination before the war, too.

At times, I found that Sakamoto's efforts at accuracy seemed to make the flow of the story a bit rough, such as the extensive use of direct quotations to express the feelings and actions of people. Nevertheless, this is one heck of a story and worth reading more than once. I recommend it! After reading my Kindle copy, I decided to buy the hard copy and was surprised to find that it contains many photographs none of which is on the Kindle version.