"Born Stateless" is a book of memories crisp in detail and depth of feeling. Konstantin Balabushkin's young life in Japan bridged the two worlds of east and west with apparent ease. His safe and sheltered childhood vanished with the eruption of Second World War while he attended college in Shanghai waiting for his visa to study in the United States. He and other stateless people, including Russian nobles with whom he lived, became trapped in history with no way out. The war, the defeat and reinvention of Japan and the reinvention of Konstantin Balabushkin, as Kon Balin, bring to the reader a first hand account of suffering and survival. It is a young man's tale, a very lucky young man, who lived through a time that profoundly changed the world.