Both for those aspects of the book and the core story — the march, its aftermath and the treatment of the prisoners — the Normans interviewed more than 400 people in the U.S., Japan and the Philippines for the book. They make use of private diaries and letters, including those of Japanese military men, to not only explore what happened but to provide first hand insight into how it impacted those involved. Many of these excerpts can only be called harrowing. Yet they not only reveal what the Japanese did, but the impact of continued brutality on the human psyche and the levels to it might lead a man to resort.
Yet Tears in the Darkness doesn't read like some stodgy historical tome. It is cogent and engrossing but never dogmatic. Granted, we are all appalled at what takes place in the course of the book. With the contemporary firsthand accounts and even explaining, for example, just what lack of water does to a person, the Normans allow us to attempt to grasp just how excruciating and horrendous things were. "Every man was forced to look inward," they write. "Those who saw nothing — and there were many — abandoned all hope of ever seeing home again. It was almost as if death itself had become contagious[.]"
There is, of course, no good reason for the maltreatment, starvation, torture and massacre of the prisoners. Still, the book goes beyond the emotional aspect of the story to look at how and why this may have happened. This examination is broad also. For example, the Normans look not only at cultural issues and the raw emotion of revenge, but also how American and Filipino preparedness played a role as this appalling chapter of American, Filipino and Japanese history opened.
It isn't often someone recommends a book that explores such evil, horrifying and torturous events. Tears in the Darkness, though, is essential reading for anyone who wants a full picture of the Bataan Death March or a touch of insight into why evil lives longer than the men responsible for it.
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