Nagasaki

Life After Nuclear War

By: Susan Southard

Narrated by: Traci Kato-Kiriyama

Length: 12 hrs and 16 mins

Publisher's summary

A powerful and unflinching account of the enduring impact of nuclear war, told through the stories of those who survived.

On August 9, 1945, three days after the atomic bombing of Hiroshima, the United States dropped a second atomic bomb on Nagasaki, a small port city on Japan's southernmost island. An estimated 74,000 people died within the first five months, and another 75,000 were injured. Published on the 70th anniversary of the bombing, Nagasaki takes listeners from the morning of the bombing to the city today, telling the firsthand experiences of five survivors, all of whom were teenagers at the time of the devastation.

Susan Southard has spent years interviewing hibakusha ("bomb-affected people") and researching the physical, emotional, and social challenges of postatomic life. She weaves together dramatic eyewitness accounts with searing analysis of the policies of censorship and denial that colored much of what was reported about the bombing in both the United States and Japan.

A gripping narrative of human resilience, Nagasaki will help shape public discussion and debate over one of the most controversial wartime acts in history.

©2015 Susan Southard (P)2015 Recorded Books

Truly, A Heartrending Horrorshow

I had to go back and reread, re listen to a whoooole lot of books on the Pacific war after I finished with Nagasaki: Life After Nuclear War because it's a book that'll have you conflicted as all get out as to whether the use of atomic weaponry was necessary.
And that's because Nagasaki covers the lives of survivors, just before the blast and follows them through the nightmare of the aftermath. It's a brutal and devastating book, unflinching, unapologetically forthright and honest. Because those bombs caused untold, well, here there is some told, suffering.
Southard doesn't downplay Japanese atrocities of the war, neither does she play them up. The cruel and the brutal were just the way. Nor does she downplay the brainwashing of the Japanese citizenry who would've gladly used the utterly feudal and futile bamboo spear as a weapon against those who would invade Japan's shores. But the horrors that follow the detonation make it clear that, no matter your politics, what happened to these individuals? Nobody but the most brutal deserves.
Well-written over a span of twelve years, Nagasaki is a book that'll have you conflicted then, perhaps, resolute. It's a 12+ hour horrorshow that'll leave you shaken, gasping for breath.

Great book

This book was well written and educational. I have never read or been taught anything about possible survivors from the event. Most Americans wasn't aware that their were two bombs dropped on two different cities in Japan.

Powerful read

Nuclear war consequences have become too abstract. We must bring survivors anecdotal stories to our political leaders. We must push for control and reduction of nuclear stockpiles.
This was a powerful read.

Poignantly Written and Beyond Important

I first want to say that the narrator was fantastic. Sometimes even good narrators with a compelling story will lose me for a bit but she kept me locked in the entire time.

Now for the actual content. It's heartbreaking and so massively necessary to know. There's such a difference between knowing in an abstract sort of intellectual way that the suffering caused by the bombs was horrific and long lasting. But because the scale of the suffering is so beyond human imagination (and American society has insulated itself so well from the harsh realities of what happened), hearing specifics about the suffering makes it more concrete.

The point that so often Nagasaki is an afterthought in the conversation about the Atomic bombs really stuck with me. I realized I had also made that error when talking about the bombs. Not that I ever discounted the suffering or forgot about them, just that like so many, I know I have said, "the bomb" or some such shorthand and lumped the two attacks together in my head in a way, even knowing they were days apart. Sometimes you need what should be obvious pointed out to you and I appreciate that she did so here as non-judgmentally as she did.

It is bias, misleading, and drags on

I have heard at least four different perspectives on what lead to the use of the atomic bomb, and therefore have an uncommon knowledge of the facts involved.

Bias: If this author is not guilty of being a revisionist, they are at least guilty of making no attempt to hide their own personal bias, and of misrepresenting facts to persuade others to see things their way.

Misleading: The author points out that the person sent to report on what happened at Hiroshima didn’t report his findings until after the second bomb was dropped. Although true, this implies that the Japanese government was not aware of the devastation caused by the bomb, or even what the bomb was. In reality, they already knew that the entire city had been wiped out by a single bomb the day after it happened. They already knew what an atomic bomb was because they had been working on one of there own which they only stopped working on because they didn’t think it would be ready in time to help with the war. The person sent to report was only sent to verify whether or not it was an atomic bomb that was used. Therefore, the lateness of the report was irrelevant to the whether it was necessary or right to drop the second bomb within the that time frame. This is just one of many facts manipulated to make the use of the bombs seem unnecessary, and to villainize those who made the decision to use the bombs.

Drags on: The last five hours is spent talking about what could have been summed up with the following sentence: The survivors eventually found the courage to live rich, fulfilling lives despite their deformities, and put forth constant pressure to rid the world of nuclear arsenals through the sharing of their stories.”