Questions About The Last Train from Hiroshima: The Survivors Look Back

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Answered Questions (3)

Tempted to read it, after having read Hiroshima of John Hersey. But, is this book some sort of romanced history ? Or historic novel ?

Charles Pellegrino No, it is not by any stretch of the imagination in the category of historic novel. In the first edition, a single aviator exaggerated part of his war …moreNo, it is not by any stretch of the imagination in the category of historic novel. In the first edition, a single aviator exaggerated part of his war record, even though he was actually on the island from which the Hiroshima mission was launched and actually was in the air that day (aboard the plane Bad Penny, and not the much nearer to Hiroshima photographic plane, Necessary Evil). That person, Joe Fuoco, and his testimony (total about 5 pages) has been removed from all subsequent editions. In 2010, the NY Times entertainment reporter and the 1st edition publisher's Vice President both lost their jobs for allowing themselves to be spoofed by impersonators of everyone from James Cameron and famed Hiroshima artist Nakazawa, to a Vice Chancellor at my university (with a gross quote claiming I had "flunked out" of my Ph.D. program) - which collectively gave the impression that survivors were made up and my scientific credentials were fake. Amid claims from a Los Alamos nuclear physicist who turned out never to have existed (insisting that atomic bombs could not create shadow images or disintegrate people), all of the spoofings were traced back to no more than a half dozen internet trolls, most of them belonging to a small neo-Nazi group - upset that I had written two archaeology books describing the Jewishness of the original Jesus movement. (Presently, two people are writing books about this and its related "Jurassic Zoo" flap; one book, based on a whole Ph.D. thesis, written by a woman who began following one of the hoaxes against my work). Not one survivor was removed from the second edition - published under Mark Selden's Cornell University imprint at Rowman and Littlefield, with a forward from the director of the Hiroshima Memorial Museum. James Cameron renewed his film option. In the aftermath of the denials that Hiroshima and Nagasaki happened this way, many, many Hiroshima and Nagasaki survivors who had intended to take their stories to the grave, came forth through the two museums in Japan, telling their stories for the first time. The publisher will soon be releasing my second book on this subject (new material), written for a wider audience that will include Young Adult. "Journalists" would not have been demoted and fired for publishing troll-mail as news without fact-checking - and the prestigious R&L would not be publishing me and I would not be respected by survivors - if even one of the people in this book had been fictionalized. If you are reading dialogue in "Last Train," you can be sure that it was reconstructed on the basis of a survivor saying, "and then I said ['this'] and he then said to me..."
Omoiyari and Nyokodo, - Charles Pellegrino(less)

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Are any parts of this book fictionalized or untrue?

Charles Pellegrino No. Please see longer answers above. In the first edition, there was one American aviator from the bombing crews and photographic planes launched from…moreNo. Please see longer answers above. In the first edition, there was one American aviator from the bombing crews and photographic planes launched from Tinian Island to Japan. I removed him from all future editions. Even in the first edition, except for the Joe Fuoco error, every single person, every word from a survivor, is from firsthand eyewitness accounts collected over more than 30 years, and combined with forensic archaeology and my research with colleagues at Brookhaven National Laboratory. In the later editions (To Hell and back: The Last Train from Hiroshima) more survivors came forth, including several who had been reluctant all their lives to speak with an American on this subject. Many of those who attacked this book in media and on blogs, and who called me anti-American for writing it, and who got the book cancelled for 5 years, were enraged because I had refused to include a chapter "justifying" the use of the Atomic bombs. (less)

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I've just finished To Hell and Back: The Last Train from Hiroshima. Is this the same book as The Last Train from Hiroshima: The Survivors Look Back? Thank you

Charles Pellegrino It is a new edition of "The Last Train from Hiroshima" - with much new material added. After false reports in the American press that people and event…moreIt is a new edition of "The Last Train from Hiroshima" - with much new material added. After false reports in the American press that people and events were made up (based on claims by spoofers - over which a Holt Vice President and a NYT reporter lost their jobs) - many, many survivors came forth telling their stories for the first time. For example, double atomic bomb survivor, who had been hiding from the public with his family since 1957, came forth through the Nagasaki Museum, and finally told us the rest of the story - and it turns out to be among history's most heartbreaking stories of doomed love.
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