Eve of A Hundred Midnights

The Star-Crossed Love Story of Two WwII Correspondents and Their Epic Escape Across the Pacific

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The unforgettable true story of two married journalists on an island-hopping run for their lives across the Pacific after the Fall of Manila during World War II—a saga of love, adventure, and danger.

On New Year’s Eve, 1941, just three weeks after the attack on Pearl Harbor, the Japanese were bombing the Philippine capital of Manila, where journalists Melville and Annalee Jacoby had married just a month earlier. The mood that evening in Manila’s Bay View Hotel was grim. Mel and Annalee had worked in China as members of a tight community of foreign correspondents with close ties to Chinese leaders; if captured by invading Japanese troops, they were certain to be executed. Racing to the docks just before midnight, they barely escaped on a freighter—the beginning of a tumultuous journey that would take them from one island outpost to another. While keeping ahead of the approaching Japanese, Mel and Annalee covered the harrowing war in the Pacific Theater—two of only a handful of valiant and dedicated journalists reporting from the region.

"Gripping, impressively researched ... A seamless narrative of daring and dedication." -Kirkus (Starred review)

Bill Lascher calls upon the Jacobys’ personal letters, deep historical research, and extensive interviews to bring to life the couple’s thrilling odyssey, and capture their love affair with Asia and each other. Bringing to light their compelling personal stories and their professional life together, Eve of a Hundred Midnights is a tale of an unquenchable thirst for adventure, of daring reportage at great personal risk, and of an enduring romance that blossomed in the shadow of war.

“Propulsive. ... [A] remarkable book, which is part history, part a celebration of war correspondence, but, mostly, a love story. ... Lascher conveys the privation, danger, and romance of this time in an utterly detailed and beguiling way.” -Booklist (Starred review)

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