This is a terrible and important book. Iris Chang is certainly right in her estimation that few Americans know about the Rape of Nanking but that Americans almost universally know something about the Holocaust. I can't recall having encountered anything in public school regarding the subject, probably because it's relegated to non-U.S. History and not officially considered part of World War II in most public school curricula.

Either way, in lieu of actual memoirs or diaries (in English) documenting the harrowing experiences of the Japanese pillaging and mass murder in Nanking, this book will have to suffice for most readers. Be warned, though, that as the title suggests this book does not sugarcoat the events that transpired in Nanking and discusses the atrocities in brutal, visceral language that will unnerve and trouble many, as it should.


I believe that Chang gave the basic events and narrative of what happened a fair treatment and put it into prose that is lucid and understandable for any interested reader. However, she goes into some detail criticizing the United States and other powers for not intervening in Nanking to stop the atrocities. I am not sure this is a fair criticism, considering it is hard to imagine the United States intervening in the Second Sino-Japanese War under any circumstances less than something akin to Pearl Harbor. On the other hand, European powers who had colonial interests in the region were already preoccupied with the rise of the Nationalist Socialist Party in Germany. There are some Westerners who play a prominent role in Chang's narrative—especially John Rabe, a Nazi Party leader in Nanking who believed in Nationalist Socialism for its benefits to the working class and did not imbibe the anti-Semitic rhetoric that led to the Holocaust. Rabe was an indefatigable defender of the Chinese that he pulled into his safe zone created in Nanking. It is also saddening that Rabe, an individual who probably helped saved 200,000 lives in Nanking, became a penniless beggar after World War II because of his affiliations with the Nazi Party.

Highly recommended, especially to read alongside primary or secondary sources of the Holocaust.