New York: Harper Collins [Reagan Books], (1996.) dj. Hardcover first edition - Japanese American writer's very highly praised first novel. 'Cast out of his native California, 'relocated' to an armed camp, and made a victim of almost unbearable family loss, Billy Fujita finds himself in the coldest reaches of Massachusetts in the closing months of World War II. A spirited widow, Margaret Kelly, has helped secure his release in the hope that Fujita, a horticulturist, will turn her barren land into a working farm. Together with Margaret, a war widow named Livvie, and her damaged young son, Garvin, Fujita becomes a reluctant participant in an impromptu family... a story of how even in the harshest soil the roots of love and family can thrive.' Appendix, glossary. 445 pp. ISBN: 0-06-0391642.