The Indomitable Florence Finch

March 30, 2020
Former U.S. congressman and novelist Mrazek (And the Sparrow Fell) delivers a crisp chronicle of Florence Finch’s contributions to the Philippine resistance movement during WWII. Born to an American serviceman and a Filipina woman, Finch (1915–2016) started dating U.S. naval intelligence officer Charles “Bing” Smith in late 1940 and secured a job as administrative secretary to Maj. Carl Engelhart, deputy head of U.S. Army Intelligence for the Philippines. In December 1941, Japanese armed forces invaded. Smith died in a dive bomb attack; Engelhart became a prisoner of war. Finch, meanwhile, found work with a Japanese-controlled fuel company and joined an underground network smuggling supplies to Allied prisoners. In 1944, she was arrested and sentenced to three years of hard labor. In early February 1945, American soldiers liberated her prison. Mrazek chronicles Englehart’s treatment in various POW camps to highlight the importance of smuggling efforts, and interweaves a broad overview of the war in the Philippines with an action-packed recap of Finch’s exploits, providing drama but little emotional insight. WWII buffs will relish this inside look at life under Japanese occupation; general readers will wish they got to know the heroine of the title better.

Starred review from May 1, 2020

In his third work of nonfiction on World War II, Mrazek (A Dawn like Thunder) focuses on the life of Presidential Medal of Freedom recipient Florence Finch (1915-2016). Born in the Philippines to an American father and a Filipina mother, Florence was sent to school in Manila and never returned to her family's plantation. She was eventually hired to work for the Office of Army Intelligence and married her first husband, a navy chief petty officer. They were still newlyweds at the outbreak of the war, and he was killed in action in 1942. For two years, she hid her American citizenship and worked at the Philippine Liquid Fuel Distributing Union, aiding the resistance movement. In 1944, she was arrested, raped, and tortured until she was rescued a year later by American troops. Mrazek expertly tells how she later joined the U.S. Coast Guard in order to continue aiding in the war effort, but the war ended before she could be deployed. Final chapters follow her life after the war, with her second husband and two children. VERDICT Mrazek's work showcases a wealth of primary-source material, and skillfully invites readers into Florence's remarkable life. An engaging read for all interested in women's or 20th-century history.--Crystal Goldman, Univ. of California, San Diego Lib.

Copyright 2020 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

April 1, 2020
A World War II heroine comes to light decades after the war. Mrazek, a five-term congressman and award-winning novelist, illuminates a lesser-known and appalling area of the war: life in the Philippines after the 1941 Japanese conquest. Born of an American father and Filipino mother, Florence Finch (1915-2016) attended an American-run school in Manila. As a young woman, her secretarial skills earned her jobs at the Army-Navy YMCA and then as administrative assistant in the U.S. Army Department of Intelligence. She married an American sailor in 1941. With the Japanese conquest in December 1941, her job vanished, and her husband died in battle a few months later. Concealing her American connections, she obtained a job with the Japanese-run Philippine Liquid Fuel Distribution Union, which controlled all energy resources for the island. It is historically accurate to describe Japan's behavior in the occupied Philippines as loathsome, and Mrazek offers numerous accounts of the brutality. Civilians received rough treatment, and the awful conditions in prison and internment camps were no secret. Inmates lived in squalor and on a starvation diet. "There was never enough food for everyone," writes the author. Soon after beginning work, Florence began forging ration coupons to obtain fuel, which was then sold on the black market to buy supplies for the prisoners and the resistance. Arrested in October 1944, she endured terrible torture, rape, and starvation until American forces arrived in February 1945, when she was 78 pounds and near death. After her recovery, she moved to the U.S. and married. The remainder of her life was less traumatic, and she died at the age of 101 with many honors, including the Medal of Freedom. Apparently a member of the history-is-boring school, Mrazek tells his story in a novelistic style with invented dialogue and access to everyone's thoughts. Despite the fairly lowbrow style, he capably describes significant, dramatic events. The richly detailed account of a courageous woman's life. (2 maps)

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May 1, 2020
Finch, born in Santiago, Philippines, to an American father and Filipino mother, pursued a topnotch education, married a U.S. Naval intelligence officer, and was hired in 1941 as administrative secretary to the deputy head of U.S. Army Intelligence for the Philippines. When the Japanese invaded, she escaped arrest and imprisonment by hiding her American identity and passing as fully Filipino. This allowed her to remain free and to work secretly for the ferociously brave Filipino resistance, while also providing crucial aid to American POWs. Eventually captured, raped, and tortured, she survived as a war widow, moved to the U.S., and was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom for her numerous acts of heroism. Finch's history would be little-known if not for the efforts of her family to document her story, and acclaimed novelist and historian Mrazek has crafted a compelling narrative which also provides rich coverage of the overall war in the Philippines. A perfect match of author and subject, this should generate wide interest among fans of military, women's, and Asian American history. Women in Focus: The 19th in 2020(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2020, American Library Association.)