Booklist Review

A modest but valuable addition to the literature of women in the military, this is the story of a WAC cryptographer, one of only 150 Signal Corps women assigned to the southwest Pacific theater. After two years as a civilian clerk at an army camp in Texas, where she met and married her first husband, Weise joined the WACs and served in New Guinea, the Philippines, and occupied Japan. Although recognized as doing invaluable work, WAC cryptographers suffered, as did other women in the Pacific, from limited administrative support and from logistical support that resembled a thread more than a shoestring. They also suffered a major crisis of morale when the sudden end of the war left them overseas and in limbo. Weise, in particular, faced family opposition to her serving at all, yet she and most of her comrades persisted to play their part in laying the foundations for today's military. --Roland Green