By the laws of statistics John Wyatt should not be alive to tell his story. During the Malayan campaign his regiment lost two-thirds of its men. More than 300 patients and staff in the Alexandra Military Hospital, Singapore were slaughtered by the Japanese. Twenty-six percent of soldiers slaving on the Burma Railway died. Many died on the Asaka Maru, which was torpedoed, and the Hakasan Maru, the second grim hellship that took on survivors. Many more POWs did not survive the freezing Japanese winter of 1944/45. Yet John survived all these traumatic events and his chronicle makes a humbling and unforgettable book.