23 February: Iwo Jima Day

Iwo Jima Day is the anniversary of the day the US flag was raised on the Japanese island of Iwo Jima, 75 years ago today in 1945. 10 things you might not know about the event.

1. The Battle of Iwo Jima took place between 10 February and 26 March 1945. It was a major battle of the second World War in which American forces captured the Japanese island. The Americans wanted the island because it had three airfields and would make an ideal base for subsequent attacks on Japan.
2. The invasion of Iwo Jima was the first time the Americans had attacked Japanese home territory. The Japanese forces refused to surrender, which led to the five week battle in which over six thousand Americans and about 18,000 Japanese troops lost their lives.
3. There's an iconic photograph taken during the battle of a group of American soldiers raising a US flag in the middle of the battle, on 23 February 1945. The picture was taken by Joe Rosenthal on top of Mount Suribachi, an extinct volcano and the highest point on the island. It was over a month later before the battle was actually over.
4. Iwo Jima means "sulphur island" and is located about 650 nautical miles/1,200km south of Tokyo. The island is volcanic in origin. Nobody lived there until the 19th century when Japan built a sugar mill and a sulphur mine there. Its area is just eight square miles.
5. After the battle, the US occupied the island until 1968. During the remainder of the war, it served as an emergency landing site for US aircraft. Nobody lives there now apart from some Japanese military personnel at a naval base. Special permission is required to visit it, although since the island smells of sulphur and has little vegetation, and there's the risk of stumbling upon live ordnance, it's not an ideal holiday spot, anyway.
6. The Japanese defence forces were led by Tadamichi Kuribayashi, who chose to keep fighting in order to do as much damage to the Americans as possible and dent their spirits, while at the same time buying time for the rest of Japan to get ready for an invasion. His strategy was to build eleven miles of tunnels under the island for bunkers, ammunition stores and for making concealed attacks.
7. The Americans had thought that Iwo Jima's beaches would be easy to negotiate, but when they got there, they found the Black volcanic ash didn't provide a good footing and there were steep slopes to climb up. To cap it all, there were Japanese troops waiting until the American troops were all on the beach before opening fire.
8. Over 800 messages were sent and received during the battle, and for that the Americans used Navajo code talkers. The Navajo language is so complex it was impossible for the Japanese to break their codes.
9. 22 US Marines and 5 members of the US Navy won Medals of Honor - America's highest military decoration - for their part in the battle. That was over a fifth of the Medals of Honor awarded to Marines throughout the whole of the war.
10. While most of the Japanese forces surrendered, two Japanese soldiers remained hidden on the island for six years. They finally surrendered in 1951.

Settling the Score

Another collection of short stories, even more murder and mayhem with carol singers, an orchestra out for revenge, a sinister magic stone and a haunted mansion.

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A Tale of Two Sisters

During a battle with supervillains, a horrific accident leaves the Warner family with no option but to believe their youngest daughter, Jessica, is dead. It doesn't occur to them that the bad guys could, or would, save her.

Jessica wakes up with no memory of who she is or how she came to be on a space station with two bionic legs, a bionic arm and a bionic eye. She is told her family abandoned her and is sent back to Earth with a mission - to kill them. While Jessica wants to kill her family, along with the twin boys who once rejected her, she knows what the Alliance of Supervillains are asking her to do is a suicide mission. She decides to get her revenge in her own way.

As Jessica puts the first part of her revenge plan in motion, she finds herself with an agonising decision to make. Before she can decide, the Alliance come for her, determined to make her do their bidding. This time, it's the Alliance who leave her, crippled and at the mercy of the Warner family, who have no idea who the Alliance's Black Rose really is.

Jessica finds herself having to re-think her decisions in light of what she now learns about her family, the Alliance, the twins, and herself. It would appear the Alliance have left her with an unwanted and permanent reminder of her time with them. Or have they?

Jessica's older sister, Jill, knows her destiny is to be a doctor and specialise in bionics and genetic variant medicine. She is also hopelessly in love with Christopher, Crown Prince of Galorvia. Can their romance survive the lies Christopher told her when they were both at school, an unplanned pregnancy and Sophie, the wannabe princess who comes between them?

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