Imprint
- MacLehose Press
- MacLehose Press
Netherlands, Republic of South Africa, Fiction, Modern & contemporary fiction (post c 1945), Second World War fiction, Fiction in translation
A young drifter makes an unforgettable friendship in wartime before fate leaves him once again alone and unable to settle.
In January 1935, Rob, a young Dutchman, departs to Capetown in search of adventure. After a brutal stint in the diamond mines, Rob sails to Java to join up in the Dutch army which is making a last stand against the Japanese invading army. Here he meets a fellow Dutchman, Guus, in whom he finds a soul mate, the best friend he will ever have.
They are soon captured by the Japanese. Together they survive the hell of labouring on the Burma railway, and together they leap off their ship when it is torpedoed. Rob never sees his friend again, but he spends his life unable to find peace with the shadow of the past hanging over him, unable to accept love, unable to forgive himself for his imagined failings.
More books by Otto de Kat
Otto de Kat
Otto de Kat is the pen name of the founder of Dutch non-fiction publishing house Balans, Jan Guert Gaarlandt, also a poet, novelist and critic. His prize-winning novels have been widely published in Europe, and Man on the Move was the winner of the Netherlands' Halewijn Literature Prize.
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