If you’re a youth in 1941 living in San Francisco and a graduate of Stanford University, fluent in speech communications, especially Japanese, your talents were needed by Army intelligence immediately.
If the United States went to war against Japan, intelligence realized they had very few personnel that could speak the language or understand the culture, Including Japanese Americans. Their search of universities throughout the United States turned up very sparse results.
They started a school to teach the Japanese language and, if possible, the culture of the isolated country to future code breakers. The Presidio, a military post in San Francisco, was chosen to go forward immediately with the task.
The next priority was to compose a cryptology dictionary of the language, similar to what Churchill had done at Bletchley Park. It was the central site for British code breakers, intercepting and decoding the German transmission.
The youth of American stepped up to the challenge, including an extraordinarily talented young lady, Sue Lee Ono. She was fluent in Japanese, German, Spanish, French and understood several Chinese dialects. Sue Lee grew up in San Francisco in Japantown under the tutelage of her dear Uncle Yoshi. He taught her the knowledge of the Japanese culture and a deep understanding of the history and artifacts. Uncle Yoshi was a collector and a known authority of Asian art.
Sue Lee settles into the routine at the Presidio, helping to set up a school for Japanese Americans eager to do their part for their country against the ever-present prejudice.
With the bombing of Pearl Harbor, all hell breaks loose!
Sue Lee is caught in a murderous past after the death of her beloved Uncle Yoshi along with the ever-changing World War!
D.M. Sorlie created the Sue Lee Mysteries, an historical fiction series that follows a timeline set during and after World War Two. The stories document global efforts to locate looted art for museums. D.M.’s work has been crafted during his extensive journeys with his beloved wife, who serves as his critic.
Writing from a Parisian apartment, Harry’s Bar in Rome, or while in New Zealand searching for Amelia Earhart for his book, “My Friend Amelia,: are just some of their adventures that inspired D.M.’s work.