“A riveting tale about war, intrigue, love, and perseverance.” —John Grisham “Absorbing...Unfolds like a detective novel...The story barrels ahead urgently...Duty, anger, sorrow, conscience and even hope mix together to form the novel’s bracingly intimate ending.” — The Wall Street Journal “What if not two but three atomic bombs wound up in the Pacific theater?...Hawley’s impeccably detailed narrative offers an unnerving fictional answer...The novel’s tension mounts in highly cinematic fashion, despite our awareness of what the history books tell us.” — The New York Times “Thrilling...Builds to a pulse-pounding climax. The result is the most imaginative take on Hiroshima since Edwin Corley’s The Jesus Factor .” — Publishers Weekly (starred review) A sweeping and suspenseful novel of love and war, set in Japan during the final days of World War II, with a shocking historical premise: three atomic bombs were actually delivered to the Pacific—not two—and when one of them falls into the hands of the Japanese, the fate of a couple that has been separated from one another becomes entangled with the fate of this terrifying new device. War has taken everything from physicist Keizo Kan. His young daughter was killed in the Great Tokyo Air Raid, and now his Japanese American wife, Noriko, has been imprisoned by the brutal Thought Police. An American bomber, downed over Japan on the first day of August 1945, offers the scientist a surprising chance at salvation. The Imperial Army dispatches him to examine an unusual device recovered from the plane’s wreckage—a bomb containing uranium—and tells him that if he can unlock its mysteries, his wife will be released. Working in secrecy under crushing pressure, Kan begins to disassemble the bomb and study its components. One of his assistants falls ill after mishandling the uranium, but his alarming deterioration, and Kan’s own symptoms, are ignored by the commanding officer demanding results. Desperate to stave off Japan’s surrender to the Allies, the army will stop at nothing to harness the weapon’s unimaginable power. They order Kan to prepare the bomb for manual detonation over a target—a suicide mission that will strike a devastating blow against the Americans. Kan is soon confronted with a series of agonizing decisions that will test his courage, his loyalty, and his very humanity. An extraordinary debut novel that is the result of twenty-seven years of work by its author, Daikon is a gripping and powerfully moving saga that calls to mind such classics as Cold Mountain . It is set amid the chaos and despair of the world’s third largest city lying in ruins, its population starving and its leadership under escalating assault from without and within. Here is a haunting epic of love, survival, and impossible choices that introduces a singular new voice on the literary landscape. “Hawley spins a compelling tale told entirely from the Japanese perspective. Deeply researched science; a window into nationalism in all its ugliness; love, resilience and humanity even as everything around you is destroyed. . . . Daikon is alternative history at its best.” — NPR “What if not two but three atomic bombs wound up in the Pacific theater? And what if the third one fell into the hands of the enemy when an American plane crashed on the Japanese mainland? Hawley’s impeccably detailed narrative offers an unnerving fictional answer. . . . The novel’s tension mounts in highly cinematic fashion, despite our awareness of what the history books tell us.” —Alida Becker, The New York Times “[An] absorbing alternative history . . . Daikon —the word, meaning radish, becomes the bomb’s codename—unfolds like a detective novel, as Kan works backward to grasp how the weapon was made. . . . The story barrels ahead urgently, as the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki take place while Kan is working. . . . Duty, anger, sorrow, conscience and even hope mix together to form the novel’s bracingly intimate ending. Even in alternate histories, it is startling to consider how single decisions can decide worldwide outcomes.” —Sam Sacks, The Wall Street Journal “Since 1945, there have been rumors that the U.S. military hauled at least three atomic bombs to Japan, one for Hiroshima and one for Nagasaki. What happened to the third? The truth will never be known, but Samuel Hawley has crafted a breathtaking story of what might have been. Meticulously researched and beautifully written, Daikon is a riveting tale about war, intrigue, love, and perseverance.” —John Grisham “It’s the last gasp of WWII in a world with three atomic bombs—and Japan has one of them. A young physicist and his imprisoned wife get caught in the crosshairs in this stunning novel that takes a fresh, unexpected look at a well-trod period in history.” —People magazine “An engrossing and thought-provoking novel . . . The plot feels entirely plausible, and none of the characters fit any obvio