Facing the Wave: A Journey in the Wake of the Tsunami

by Gretel Ehrlich

Kirkus Best Books of the Year • Kansas City Star Best Books of the Year

A passionate student of Japanese poetry, theater, and art for much of her life, Gretel Ehrlich felt compelled to return to the earthquake-and-tsunami-devastated Tohoku coast to bear witness, listen to survivors, and experience their terror and exhilaration in villages and towns where all shelter and hope seemed lost. In an eloquent narrative that blends strong reportage, poetic observation, and deeply felt reflection, she takes us into the upside-down world of northeastern Japan, where nothing is certain and where the boundaries between living and dying have been erased by water.
 
The stories of rice farmers, monks, and wanderers; of fishermen who drove their boats up the steep wall of the wave; and of an eighty-four-year-old geisha who survived the tsunami to hand down a song that only she still remembered are both harrowing and inspirational. Facing death, facing life, and coming to terms with impermanence are equally compelling in a landscape of surreal desolation, as the ghostly specter of Fukushima Daiichi, the nuclear power complex, spews radiation into the ocean and air. Facing the Wave is a testament to the buoyancy, spirit, humor, and strong-mindedness of those who must find their way in a suddenly shattered world.

• ISBN10: 0307907325
• ISBN13: 9780307907325
• Publish Date: 10 May 2014 (first published 12 February 2013)
• Publish Status: Active
• Publisher: Random House USA Inc
• Imprint: Vintage Books
• Format: eBook
• Pages: 150
• Language: English

Reviews

[Beth C.]

Like everyone else around the world, I watched in horror as Japan's coast was devastated by the tsunami on March 11, 2011. The horror was mingled with an awe so strong that it is hard to put into words - Mother Nature's strength and power were absolutely overwhelming, even from the safety of my living room so many miles away. As our concern grew for the exchange students we had hosted, both after the original earthquake and then after the tsunami, it was heartbreaking to see the expanse of the waste. I remember asking myself, "How will they deal with this?".

Facing the Wave details just how so many dealt with the aftermath, as well as the stories of those who lived through it. The strength, bravery and resilience of so many are just as inspiring as the tsunami was horrifying. Gretel Ehrlich alternates between the strengths of poetry and beautiful writing and the strengths of facts to tell not just a story of the aftermath, but the story of the Japanese people as a whole. Those who risked their lives to help others, those who continue to risk their lives to help abandoned animals in the no/go zone, and those who simply keep putting one foot in front of the other in the face of overwhelming odds. The priests who walked for miles and miles to pray, the geisha who finally passed on her last remembered song, and the fishermen who lost it all. All of these stories, surrounded by a landscape that is bleak and bloated with the dead, a government who is practicing a cover-up of epic proportions, and entire areas that shifted over and down, not by inches, but by several FEET. And finally, the over-riding shadow of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant and the inescapable radiation that poisoned the air, the land, and even the sea from which so many draw sustenance and their livelihoods.

Facing the Wave is a book of heartbreaking beauty and absolute cruelty. It is best read in smaller portions, as it is all too easy to get overwhelmed. But far from being a book of horrors alone, it is also a book of the strength, the love, and even the happiness and humor of the Japanese people. The beauty of much of the writing had me underlining passages, as I wanted to be able to go back and read them over again. There is a spare beauty to much of the poetry included within the book, and it fits the narrative well.

This is a book that I'm glad I took the time to read. It's not a long book, but it is emotional, just by the very nature of what it covers. But it gives hope and strength, and that alone is always worthwhile.