Hunters' Island

The parallel stories of a young American farmboy and a Japanese student, who end up in a deadly game of cat and mouse on a Pacific island.

It is a world war between with the lives and cultures of empires at stake, the largest and most vicious war to sweep across the globe. In spite of the sweep of the war around the world, in August 1942 many were focused on a rugged and brutal South Pacific island called Guadalcanal. Here, two determined nations pitted all they could spare committing every airplane, ship and soldier they could funnel into the cauldron. It was not just men viciously battling each other to the death, but inhospitable terrain, weather, disease, illness and even starvation plagued both sides. Starvation Island ‘the Canal’ was called by the Americans, and the Japanese used the same phrase, ga-to to describe gadarukanaru.

Private Henrik Hahnemann was an eighteen year old Missouri farm boy growing up in the hard scrabble times of the Great Depression. Known for his hunting skills, his close-knit family often depended on him to bring home dinner. Shaken and bitter about the dastardly Japanese sneak attack, he was fixated on revenge and righting a great wrong. He chose the Marine Corps as the means for his personal retribution. Granted an early high school graduation, ‘Handyman’ Henrik struggled with the change from a peaceful farmer’s son, but his platoon came to recognize his shooting and hunting skills. When the chips were down he summoned the determination necessary to survive against hopeless odds.

Superior Private Obatia Yoshiro was an average twenty year old student expected to eventually take over his father’s glass works along with the production of mysterious glass spheres for the Japanese Army. The unassuming economics student has another side seldom seen by most. In the summer months he crews his uncle’s fishing boat, exposing him to the physical and mental demands of the elements. His school plans suddenly undermined by a draft notice, he makes the best of a dismal and brutal life of absolute obligation and unquestioning obedience.

Values and beliefs, discipline and obedience, massed firepower or skill at arms, which would prevail in this nightmare? Or was it a matter of the small Stars and Stripes flag carried by one or the belt of a thousand stitches—sen’ninbari—carried by the other? Would either protect or inspire?

Would they see home again, or did it matter?