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Title details for Memoirs of a Kamikaze by Kazuo Odachi - Available

Memoirs of a Kamikaze

A World War II Pilot's Inspiring Story of Survival, Honor and Reconciliation

by Kazuo Odachi
Alexander Bennett
ebook
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**Independent Publisher Book Award (IPPY) Winner**
An incredible, untold story of survival and acceptance that sheds light on one of the darkest chapters in Japanese history.
This book tells the story of Kazuo Odachi who—in 1943, when he was just 16 years-old—joined the Imperial Japanese Navy to become a pilot. A year later, he was unknowingly assigned to the Kamikaze Special Attack Corps—a group of airmen whose mission was to sacrifice their lives by crashing planes into enemy ships. Their callsign was "ten dead, zero alive."
By picking up Memoirs of a Kamikaze, readers will experience the hardships of fighter pilot training—dipping and diving and watching as other trainees crash into nearby mountainsides. They'll witness the psychological trauma of coming to terms with death before each mission, and breathe a sigh of relief with Odachi when his last mission is cut short by Japan's eventual surrender. They'll feel the anger at a government and society that swept so much of the sacrifice under the rug in its desperation to rebuild.
Odachi's innate "samurai spirit" carried him through childhood, WWII and his eventual life as a kendo instructor, police officer and detective. His attention to detail, unwavering self-discipline and impenetrably strong mind were often the difference between life and death. Odachi, who is now well into his nineties, kept his Kamikaze past a secret for most of his life. Seven decades later, he agreed to sit for nearly seventy hours of interviews with the authors of this book—who know Odachi personally. He felt it was his responsibility to finally reveal the truth about the Kamikaze pilots: that they were unsuspecting teenagers and young men asked to do the bidding of superior officers who were never held to account.
This book offers a new perspective on these infamous suicide pilots. It is not a chronicle of war, nor is it a collection of research papers compiled by scholars. It is a transcript of Odachi's words.

  • Creators

  • Publisher

  • Release date

    September 15, 2020

  • Formats

    • Kindle Book

      • ISBN: 9781462921492

    • OverDrive Read

      • ISBN: 9781462921492

    • EPUB ebook

      • ISBN: 9781462921492
      • File size: 16555 KB

  • Languages

    • English

  • Reviews

    • Publisher's Weekly

      June 8, 2020
      WWII kamikaze pilot Odachi relates his experiences as a survivor of multiple suicide missions in this eye-opening and informative account. Recruited as a fighter pilot in 1944, Odachi flew combat missions against American aircraft in the Philippines before being “invited to volunteer” for kamikaze attacks when he was just 17 years old. (“We were essentially cajoled into committing suicide,” he writes.) He wasn’t selected for a suicide mission until after he and the other Japanese pilots at Clark Field in Manila were evacuated to Taiwan in January 1945. On his first suicide sortie, Odachi couldn’t find a suitable target and returned to base after ditching his 1,000–pound bomb, a pattern he repeated several times over the next few months. (He describes the failed missions as “nauseating” for him and the other kamikaze pilots: “We had already psyched ourselves into a death frenzy.”) Odachi’s eighth mission was scratched in August when news arrived that Japan had surrendered, and he went on to a long career in the Tokyo police department. Enhanced with helpful historical sidebars and footnotes, Odachi’s memoir humanizes a much-mythologized aspect of the war in the Pacific. WWII history buffs and Japanophiles will savor the many insights.

    • Library Journal

      July 1, 2020

      The Japanese kamikaze pilots of World War II have a mythical status, even though they were often boys and young men with minimal training. Odachi, who was only 16 when he joined the Imperial Japanese Navy, was one of the few trained on flying the Mitsubishi A6M Zero. He would end up training and flying with the men who sacrificed themselves for Japan. His memoir, originally released in Japan in 2016 and cowritten by author and translator Shigeru Ota and journalist Hiroyoshi Nishijima, gives a firsthand account of actions across Taiwan and China up to what would have been Odachi's last mission, canceled owing to Japan's surrender in 1945. But this memoir isn't just about Odachi's time as a pilot; later chapters center on his life as a detective in Tokyo during the post-war years and his dedication to the martial art of Kendo. This focus away from the military broadens this account to reflect on life during both war and reconstruction. The book is expertly translated from Japanese by Bennett. VERDICT Odachi provides personal insight on the last days of empire, and his stories of crime in Tokyo give this memoir life. This book deserves a spot next to Yasuo Kawahara's classic autobiography Kamikaze.--John Rodzvilla, Emerson Coll., Boston

      Copyright 2020 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

Formats

  • Kindle Book
  • OverDrive Read
  • EPUB ebook

subjects

Languages

  • English

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