This is one of those books to which the word entertaining does not apply. Compelling, enthralling, illuminating perhaps but not entertaining. Told from three different perspectives, that of the Japanese soldiers, that of the Chinese and that of the Westerners who remained to establish a safety zone, this book seeks to remind the world of what is sometimes referred to as the forgotten holocaust. Told from the Japanese perspective, we are recounted the details of a killing competition between two officers.

The Japan Advertiser ran their picture under the bold headline, "Contest to kill First 100 Chinese with Sword Extended When Both Fighters Exceed Mark - Mukai scores 106 and Noda 105" (Japan Advertiser)

From the Chinese perspective there is an unequivocal tragedy of gargantuan proportions. Up to 300,000 soldiers and civilians were slaughtered. This number was the equivalent of approximately half the entire population at the time of the fall. Of course, these figures are challenged by many people and in general opinions are split into two camps: the recognitionists and the revisionists. In Japan to this day some still refute the nature and the degree of the rape and massacre and attempt to whitewash history so that Japan's true activities during the war are not exposed for the sanctioned barbarism that they were.

Perhaps one of the most sinister aspects of the malaise in Japanese education is the deliberate obstruction of important historical information about World War II through textbook censorship.

We are told of the small number of Westerners who remained in Nanking to establish safety zones. One, John Rabe was chairman of the International Committee for the Nanking Safety Zone and also a Nazi. He came to be known as the Oskar Schindler of the east. There were many others who through their determination and tireless effort saved many lives and prevented many rapes. The story has many heroes but set against the backdrop of such a tragedy it is difficult to comprehend the actions of the villains. Some of the Chinese themselves showed remarkable resilience.

Not all Chinese, of course, submitted easily to extermination in Nanking. The Rape of Nanking is a story not only of mass victimization but of individual strength and courage. There were men who clawed their way out of shallow graves, or clung to reeds for hours in the icy Yangtze River, or laid buried for days under the corpses of friends before dragging their bullet-ridden bodies to the hospital, sustained only by a tenacious will to survive.

Chang looks at some of the possible explanations for the barbarism of the Japanese but concludes little in this respect. Perhaps it is as Milgram determined through his famous experiments. "Erosion of a sense of personal responsibility is the most far reaching consequence of submission to authority." The Rape Of Nanking is of enormous documentary value and worth reading even if one must forsake entertainment in the process.