About The Book Sakura Forever

Life is a series of choices: to live or die, to be happy or sad, to be productive or pointless, these are paths from which we select our directions every day. Life is faith, the enduring belief that the goodness we create, the hopes that we radiate, will come back to us in kind. 

So many of us slog through our time on this planet supposing that decisions are made for us and that fate occurs to us when genuine fulfillment is based in and on our own actions. Contentment and joy come from what we give not what we are given. Life is perfect in its imperfections. How we live is often as mysterious as why we die, and lying between these two states, unique in its improbability, is the story of survival. These fundamental principles are embodied in Sumiko Valdez, a remarkable woman who chose to live. 

Sumiko has thwarted death too many times to count. This tiny, wise, lovely, long-orphaned angel of a woman navigated the most dangerous landscapes of the 20th century, an eyewitness to the atomic-bombing of Nagasaki, a refugee of war-torn Manchuria, a survivor of unchecked conflagrations in Manchuria and Japan, her travels and travails would be unbelievable if they weren’t brutally true. 

This is Sumiko: a child orphaned by a dying mother, a daughter sold into slavery by her father, a slave become brilliant Miko dancer, a dancer barely avoiding slow death by prostitution, a refugee fleeing innumerable war zones, a lover who lost her love, a wife learning to survive a mentally disturbed and abusive husband, a mother to a brood of thriving children and their children, a devout Christian who joyfully embodies the tenets of the Testaments, and a wonderful woman who radiates love in every direction. Sumiko’s improbable, impossible tale reveals a steadfast character and a lion’s heart much grander than a tiny not-five-foot-tall dancer’s frame that can barely contain her energy and positivity. 

Verging on 90 years as of this writing, Sumiko exudes a loving holiness, a calm trust in the next chapters of her life and soul. Her story simply must be told.