Very highly recommend reading King Rat.

Plot: “King asks for the best of each man and rewards him accordingly, irrespective of class or position.”

King Rat is a 1962 debut novel by James Clavell.

Set during World War II, the novel describes the struggle for survival of American, Australian, British, Dutch and New Zealander prisoners of war in a Japanese camp in Singapore.

Clavell was a prisoner in the Changi Prison camp, where the novel is set.