In December 1941, with surprise air raids rocking Pearl Harbor in the Hawaiian Islands and American airbases in the Philippines, General Douglas MacArthur urged the residents of Manila to evacuate the city before the Japanese bombed it as well.

Nine-year old Isabel Yumol and her family fled their home and headed to Bataan, her mother’s home province. War found them anyway, and when U.S. and Filipino forces could not hold off the Japanese invaders, life became even more tenuous for Isabel’s family as they faced a prolonged, if not permanent, enemy occupation.

In a provocative and poignant story, Isabel recollects life through the eyes of a young girl as she faced loss, unease, fear, uncertainty, and deprivations amid the storms of war. She developed into a serious and thoughtful young woman under the stresses of the cataclysm breaking over her homeland.