Tree of Heaven

by R.C. Binstock

Book Overview

The year is 1938. The Japanese army has occupied Nanking. Kuroda, a reluctant officer trained as a botanist, is left in charge of a garrison town. When he comes upon a starving, filthy Chinese refugee about to be raped by his soldiers, a common occurrence, he does the remarkable: he rescues her and gives her his protection. Li has no choice but to accept it; she becomes his servant, and an extraordinary intimacy ensues. Psychologically taut, etched...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 150591423X
• ISBN13: 9781505914238
• Release Date: August 1995
• Publisher: Createspace Independent Publishing Platform
• Length: 206 Pages
• Weight: 0.54 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.4" x 5.5" x 8.5"

Customer Reviews

Extraordinary

This book is an extraordinary reading experience. During the Japanese invasion of China in the late 1930's, there were examples of the most extreme barbarity by Japanese soldiers, comparable to the inhumanity practiced against Jews in the Holocaust. This book is set during that period and describes in novel form a relationship that develops between a Japanese soldier and a Chinese woman whom he rescues. I have rarely read a book that creates such a complex relationship between two people. The plot could so easily have become a melodrama about war, subservience, man and woman. Instead it felt like real lives being lived - so much ambiguity, so many things unresolved. Both the captor and the captive are strong and weak in surprising ways, experience fear and ultimately a kind of love, remember their families with deep and often conflicting emotions, feel so damaged by the horrors around them that they have trouble understanding who they are. The writing is exquisite, much of the description in simple declarative sentences that give every physical detail, every thought and emotion, tremendous immediacy.

Complexity of compassion in the clash of cultures

This is one of the most remarkable love stories I have ever read, partly because you are never sure how much these two people from different worlds can transcend their Japanese and Chinese natures to merge in a truly intimate way. Both Kuroda and Li have debts to pay, not only to each other but to those people to whom they have previously been connected. How can Kuroda express his personal compassion when he must also be true to his cultural imperatives and the men under his command? How can Li repay him for saving her life and then coming to truly love her, a lowly Chinese woman held in contempt not only by the soldiers but by her own people? There is a high price to pay, and it is paid in full. I will never forget this book and what it has taught me about the best and worst in humanity.

Love it...love it...love it.

This book is absolutely fabuloso :) I've read all of Mr. Binstock's books and this one is by far one of my favorites (right next to light of home...autographed btw hehe) The love between these two people amidst a terribly horrible war brought both tears to my eyes and a dark cloud over my heart. The horrors of both the war and the war inside the people's hearts were very apparant and very real and Mr. Binstock writes about it excellently. I recommend this book...read it. Learn something.

a beautiful book

which subtly layers all the historical research found in books such as Ian Buruma's Wages of Guilt with sensitively drawn characters that will make you weep at the highs and lows of the human spirit. The love story is generously wrought.

unbearable and wonderful at the same time

Written with kindness and commendable insight to both the Japanese and Chinese sides of this beautiful love story; it's a balm for those who have not regained their composure from the theatre of war in China. We live in the aftermath in a country that continues to try to unravel the knots of the last century albeit in relative silence.