Shame and the Captives

As in Schindler's List, Keneally draws on actual events and uses a broad backdrop—here, World War II in the Pacific—for his tale of a POW camp located in a remote corner of Australia. Tensions arise when the camp's commander, English colonel Ewan Abercare, disagrees with Australian major Bernard Suttor, in charge of the camp's Compound C, over how to deal with its "most unpredictable and surly" Japanese prisoners, particularly should they attempt a breakout. Meanwhile, a nearly idyllic romance develops between Alice Herman, who runs a farm with her father-in-law while her husband is a captive of the Germans, and Giancarlo, an Italian POW assigned to work on the farm. This romance abruptly ends when the Japanese launch a breakout from the camp. The author deftly highlights the irony of Australians trying to adhere to the Geneva Convention while a prisoner on the loose concludes, "They're mocking us by not trying to find us."