Book Review- Ghosts of the Tsunami - Richard Lloyd Parry
These are some of the facts about the earthquake that struck Japan on the 11th of March, 2011: It was the biggest in Japans history, and the fourth most powerful in the history of seismology - the earth was knocked six and a half inches off its axis and it moved Japan thirteen feet closer to America. It also caused the worst nuclear accident since Chernobyl, displaced half a million people, and caused $210 billion in damage, the costliest natural disaster in history. It also claimed 18,500 lives.
Tsunami
And it’s the human cost of the 120 foot high tsunami which is the focus of ‘Ghosts of the tsunami’ by Richard Lloyd Parry. It’s difficult to get your head around the sheer scale of this disaster, so the authors focus is on a small village called Kamaya where 74 schoolchildren and 10 teachers had died. Half of the villages inhabitants died and all of their homes were destroyed - most of those who survived were working elsewhere. Parry spends six years researching the story of what happened and talking to the survivors.
The story of the school disaster is particularly traumatic. Instead of the school administrators leading the children up a nearby hill to safety, they unwittingly walked them towards the tsunami - of the 78 children, only four survived. The trauma and grief of this loss turns to recriminations and eventually legal action against the school authorities. It becomes sad to watch a community initially bound together in grief and collective action, splintering apart in accusations and anger.
Stories
What stood out for me in the book were the individual stories. The grieving mother who learned how to operate a bulldozer, so that she could continue to look for her daughter in the rubble. Kaneta, the buddhist priest who performed exorcisms, including on one woman who had twenty five spirits that needed to be exorcised.
I’m a sceptic by nature, so when it comes to the accounts of gaki - hungry ghosts, which are people who have died prematurely and violently, wandering between worlds. I naturally attributed them to mental grief and trauma. But I don’t know - there’s just so many accounts and they can’t be easily dismissed. I didn’t realise that Japan wasn’t a particularly religious country, but ghosts are a part of it’s cultural heritage.
Japan
It certainly helps that Parry lives in the country, as he understands its culture and customs and is able to make connections with the people, who are normally naturally reserved, that he interviews over the six years he spent reporting from the disaster zone. He comes across as empathetic and undestanding and is a skilled writer and journalist
I first came across ‘ghosts of the tsunami’ in the 2022 Non fiction challenge over at book’d out after it had been submitted by another reader and I thought it looked interesting. I think this is one of the great benefits of doing a challenge, as well as the social aspect of meeting other book bloggers, you get introduced to other titles you would probably not have come across.
Summary
‘Ghosts of the tsunami’ by Richard Lloyd Parry is a heartbreaking book, full of personal stories that really bring home the scale of the human disaster. The grief of the parents of the school is difficult to fathom and I found those sections incredibly moving. This an incredibly well researched and fascinating work of non fiction.
Ghosts of the tsunami by Richard Lloyd Parry
Published by Penguin Random House
August 31, 2017
268 Pages