The Cloud Atlas

December 15, 2003
The unlikely adventures of an 18-year-old soldier trained in bomb detection and disposal during World War II are painstakingly rendered against an Alaskan backdrop in Callanan's richly textured, sturdy debut. In the mid-1940s, Sgt. Louis Belk's main mission is to seek out and detonate Japanese hot air balloons that have been armed with explosives and deployed over North America—an unusual but deadly war weapon. The slightest rumor of the balloons' existence might have a disastrous effect on American morale, which makes the job of Belk's bomb disposal unit even more critical. The unit's commanding officer, the eccentric, unbending Capt. Thomas Gurley, is a veteran spy hunter who lost a leg in an explosion and is on the verge of losing his mind. Both Gurley and Belk are smitten with Lily, an enticingly beautiful Yup'ik-Russian Eskimo seer whose great love, Saburo, a Japanese spy, is Gurley's nemesis. When the three go out in search of Saburo, they find something even more dangerous and puzzling: a booby-trapped balloon carrying a young Japanese boy. The narrative flits back and forth from Belk's harrowing exploits as a soldier to his present-day life as an Alaskan missionary tending to his friend Ronnie, who lies on his deathbed in an Alaskan hospice. Shadowed by the darkness of "arctic hysteria," the novel is brightened by crisp descriptions of bomb mechanisms and deactivation, as well as by Belk's offbeat, lyrical narration. Atmospheric and moving, this is an impressively assured debut.

Starred review from March 1, 2004
"Everyone in Alaska had a secret in World War II," explains Catholic priest Louis Belk, remembering his early days as a bomb disposal sergeant in the U.S. Army Air Corps. "Most, like me, still do." As an innocent 18-year-old, Belk was sent to the wilderness to discover and destroy giant Japanese paper balloons loaded with explosives-possibly biological weapons-before word of their existence terrorized the American public. Entranced by Lily, a beautiful, half-Yup'ik, half-Russian prostitute, and browbeaten and taunted by Captain Gurley, his violent and increasingly erratic commanding officer (and Lily's lover), Belk is compelled to a dark and deadly discovery-a plague-ridden Japanese boy inside one of the balloons. Told in a series of confessional flashbacks to a dying Eskimo shaman, this remarkable first novel mixes ethereal and haunting native folklore with vivid bomb-diffusing scenes. This little-known chapter of American history will entice the book club crowd; the strong characterizations and moral dilemmas will leave them with plenty to discuss. Highly recommended.-Christine Perkins, Burlington P.L., WA

Copyright 2004 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

December 15, 2003
During the last days of WWII, naive Sergeant Louis Belk, trained in bomb disposal, is dispatched to the harsh frontiers of Alaska on a secret mission--capture and preserve one of the most enigmatic armaments of the war, Japanese balloon bombs. Working with the disgraced yet fiercely determined Captain Gurley, a former OSS spy hunter with a brutal nature, Belk studies a mysterious journal for clues to the next landing site of one of these lethal weapons. While exploring the wild streets of Anchorage, where a woman is viewed as a lady of the night and all soldiers are on top-secret missions, Belk meets Lily, half-Russian and half-Yup'ik Eskimo and self-proclaimed palm reader. Lily slowly divulges her secrets to Belk, including the site of the next bomb drop, finally revealing a secret that could threaten national security, one that takes Belk, Gurley, and Lily on a midnight quest into the frozen tundra. Alluring characters and story make this first novel a good choice for historical fiction collections.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2003, American Library Association.)