Ray Parkin's Wartime Trilogy

Ray Parkin's classic trilogy of wartime experience hums with action, adventure and courage. Honest and plainly written, these books are full of humanity and wisdom. Parkin's own evocative drawings and sketches illustrate the work. Out of the Smoke tells the story of the HMAS Perth, her sinking by the Japanese, and the small party of survivors who try to sail a derelict lifeboat to safety, only to land in enemy hands. Into the Smother is the diary of Parkin's time as a POW on the Burma-Siam railway. Writing in secret - risking execution - he documents with remarkable restraint the sufferings he and his comrades endure at the mercy of the jungle and the Imperial Japanese Army. In The Sword and the Blossom the POWs are shipped to Japan in a crowded tramp steamer and put to work in a coal mine until the atomic bombs finally bring them freedom