Starting a few months before the city of Hiroshima was destroyed by an atomic bomb, the four-volume saga shows life in Japan after years of war and privations, as seen through the eyes of seven-year-old Gen Nakaoka. Volume 3 picks up the story with Gen, his mother and his baby brother searching for a place to rest in the bomb's aftermath. Facing rejection, hunger and humiliation, they come to realise that they still have - and can share - three crucial possessions: their self-respect, their hope and their inner strength. With an introduction by Art Spiegelman.

This compelling autobiography tells the life story of famed manga artist Nakazawa Keiji. Born in Hiroshima in 1939, Nakazawa was six years old when on August 6, 1945, the United States dropped the atomic bomb. His gritty and stunning account of the horrific aftermath is powerfully told through the eyes of a child who lost most of his family and neighbors. In eminently readable and beautifully translated prose, the narrative continues through the brutally difficult years immediately after the war, his art apprenticeship in Tokyo, his pioneering "atomic-bomb" manga, and the creation of Barefoot Gen, the classic graphic novel based on Nakazawa's experiences before, during, and after the bomb. This first English-language translation of Nakazawa's autobiography includes twenty pages of excerpts from Barefoot Gen to give readers who don't know the manga a taste of its power and scope. A recent interview with the author brings his life up to the present. His trenchant hostility to Japanese imperialism, the emperor and the emperor system, and U.S. policy adds important nuance to the debate over Hiroshima. Despite the grimness of his early life, Nakazawa never succumbs to pessimism or defeatism. His trademark optimism and activism shine through in this inspirational work.

The first volume in the "Barefoot Gen" series, this is the powerful, tragic story of the bombing of Hiroshima, seen through the eyes of the artist as a young boy growing up in Japan. Focusing not only on the effects of the bombing, Barefoot Gen also examines the ethical dilemmas faced by a peace-loving family in a highly militarized culture.

Cartoonist Keiji Nakazawa was seven years old and living in Hiroshima in the early days of 1945 when the city was destroyed by an atomic bomb dropped by the USA. Starting a few months before that event, this four-volume saga shows life in Japan after years of war and privations. Volume two tells the story of the day after the atomic bomb was dropped on Hiroshima, as seen through the eyes of seven-year-old Gen Nakaoka. Gen, his mother and his newborn sister face the horrors of the day after the bomb. This moving saga can be compared in scope and intensity to Art Spiegelman's Maus.