Overlooked No More: Kim Hak-soon, who broke the Silence for ‘Comfort Women’
New York Times, Oct. 21, 2021 Overlooked No More: Kim Hak-soon, Who Broke the Silence for ‘Comfort Women’ Her public testimony about the horrors of sexual slavery that Japan had engineered for its World War II military encouraged other survivors to step forward. This article is part of Overlooked, a series of obituaries about remarkable people whose deaths, beginning in 1851, went unreported in...
THE COMFORT BEARER WINS INTERNATIONAL RECOGNITION WITH 2021 NEW YORK CITY BIG BOOKS AWARD!!!
Cathy L. Patrenos’ novel, The Comfort Bearer has been recognized for a 2021 NYC BIG BOOK AWARD in the Women’s Fiction category!! This international competition is judged by experts from different aspects of the book industry, including publishers, writers, editors, book cover designers and professional copywriters. Selected award winners and distinguished favorites are based on overall...
Cathy Patrenos Visits Comfort Women Memorial
During a visit to my old stomping grounds in Los Angeles, we stopped by Glendale Central Park to visit the Peace Monument, memorializing the more than 200,000 girls and women removed from their homes in occupied territories and coerced into sexual slavery by the Japanese military between 1932 and 1945. It was a news story about this very monument in Glendale, where I had worked as a lawyer for...
Press Release – The Comfort Bearer
PRESS RELEASE Soon Ja Survived to Tell Her Story, Now She Wants an Apology -Sutter Creek, CA - May 24, 2021 - Releasing May 24, Cathy Patrenos’ novel, “The Comfort Bearer,” is a tale steeped in history that dives into the harsh and undeniable lives of the comfort women of WWII. In order to stay alive, the protagonist must find a way to cope with the horrible abuse she has been subjected to, and...
An Interview With Cathy
WHAT INSPIRED YOU TO TAKE ON THE DIFFICULT TOPIC OF COMFORT WOMEN, BRINGING AWARENESS TO JAPAN’S WAR CRIMES AND A TRAGIC TIME IN HISTORY? I initially began to form the concept of my novel, The Comfort Bearer after seeing a television news story about a lawsuit brought by Japanese citizens over a monument acknowledging “comfort women” that was placed in a park in Glendale, Los Angeles County,...
Yale International Conference on “Comfort Women” and Wartime Sexual Violence
The Yale International Conference on "Comfort Women" and Wartime Sexual Violence featured speakers such as Former Congressman Mike Honda and Yoshiaki Yoshimi, the founder of Center for Research and Documentation on Japan's War Responsibility. In 1992, Professor Yoshimi discovered and made public the first documents revealing the Japanese military had established and maintained the military...
Harvard professor J. Mark Ramseyer sparked outrage
Last month, Harvard professor J. Mark Ramseyer sparked outrage among fellow academics and campaigners after making unsubstantiated claims that women forced into sexual slavery by the Japanese military had chosen to work in the wartime brothels. Now he is facing a huge backlash from around the world. Representatives from China, South Korea and North Korea have all spoken out against Ramseyer’s...
Inspiration for The Comfort Bearer
I was both shocked and ashamed when I first learned of the existence of comfort women. Being an army brat who was born in Fukuoka, Japan where my father was stationed after the Korean War, I grew up with a fascination of Japan and its people and I was shocked upon learning that such atrocities took place before and during WWII. And I was ashamed because I had absolutely no clue that such crimes...
The Comfort Bearer Release Date: May 24, 2021
Releases May 24! The Comfort Bearer - A compelling story of strength, perseverance, and the will to survive. By Cathy L. Patrenos, Author About the Book: On the brink of WWII, sixteen-year-old Soon Ja is ensnared into the largest human trafficking scheme of the 20th century. She is taken to Manchuria by trickery from her home in occupied Korea and forced to become a comfort woman, a sex slave...