About this item
In the fall of 1941, the Philippines was a gardenia-scented paradise for the American Army and Navy nurses stationed there. War was a distant rumor, life a routine of easy shifts and dinners under the stars. On December 8 all that changed, as Japanese bombs began raining down on American bases in Luzon, and this paradise became a fiery hell. Caught in the raging battle, the nurses set up field hospitals in the jungles of Bataan and the tunnels of Corregidor, where they tended to the most devastating injuries of war, and suffered the terrors of shells and shrapnel. But the worst was yet to come. After Bataan and Corregidor fell, the nurses were herded into internment camps where they would endure three years of fear, brutality, and starvation. Once liberated, they returned to an America that at first celebrated them, but later refused to honor their leaders with the medals they clearly deserved.
About the Author
Elizabeth M. Norman is the daughter of two World War II veterans. Her father served with the U.S. Army in Europe in 1944; her mother was in uniform with the U.S. Coast Guard. Elizabeth began her professional career as a registered nurse before turning to the study of history and writing. She received her Bachelor of Science degree from Rutgers University. She earned her graduate and doctoral degrees from New York University, then joined the tenured faculty there in 1998. She currently is a professor in the Steinhardt School of Culture, Development and Education where she teaches history, writing and research design in the Department of Humanities and Social Sciences. She is married, has two grown sons, and a granddaughter, Florence. For many years she has lived in Montclair N. J.
In 1990, Elizabeth published her first book, Women at War: The Story of Fifty Military Nurses Who Served in Vietnam 1965-1973, (University of Pennsylvania Press) . The first edition of We Band of Angels was published in 1999. Ten years later, she co-authored Tears in the Darkness: The Story of the Bataan Death March and Its Aftermath (Picador and Farrar Straus & Giroux) which made The New York Times list of top ten nonfiction books in 2009 and was named a 2010 Dayton Literary Peace Prize finalist. Her awards include an official commendation for her research on women veterans from the U.S. Department of the Army.
She is delighted to have the opportunity to update the story of the remarkable group of women in We Band of Angels: The Untold Story of American Women Trapped on Bataan by the Japanese (2013) Random House paperback and ebook. This 2nd edition has been updated with a new ending titled, Last Woman Standing.
She and her co-author Michael Norman are working on a non-fiction book on Bellevue Hospital Center in New York City to be published by Henry Holt Inc /Macmillan.
