An Epic Novel in 20th Century Asia
Shadow of the Rising Sun(Book two of The Dragon’s Wake Trilogy) continues the Lee family’s story of struggle, obligation and destiny. The year is 1918. Japan has occupied and then annexed Korea, cruelly reducing it to a virtual slave colony, and has now begun its takeover of Manchuria as its next step to conquering all of China. Michael Y.T. Lee, son of former Minister Lee, leader of Korea’s liberation movement, is seventeen when he is sent to Peking University to prepare himself to join his father in the anti-Japanese resistance. There he meets some of the future leaders of China and falls under the influence of the country’s intellectual giants, some of whom will found the Chinese communist party. While he yearns to fight for the freedom of Korea, his ancestral homeland, which he has never seen, he realizes he must first address problems closer to home in China. Warlords and gangsters have taken over much of the country, creating anarchy and corruption throughout the land. China’s well-organized opium cartel controls Shanghai and all central and coastal China.
Y.T. joins Sun Yat-sen’s nationalist army to take back the country and unite it under a new nationalist government. He is sent to China’s new military academy where he becomes a cavalry officer and fights the warlords under the command of Chiang Kai-shek and Zhou Enlai, who were then working together. After being wounded in battle Y.T. learns that Chiang, Sun’s protégé and successor, has betrayed the government and sold it out to the opium cartel. Meanwhile Japan’s invasion of China expands unopposed. Even Shanghai, Y.T.’s home is taken over by them in their bloodthirsty pursuit of empire.
Y.T. must make agonizing choices to save his family and his life goals as the communists, nationalists, and Japanese all battle for control of China.
Shadow of the Rising Sun
by Paul E. Selinger
ISBN: 1-4257-0702-5 (Trade Paperback)
ISBN: 1-4257-0703-3 (Hardback)
Pages: 373
Subject: FICTION / Historical