From Publishers Weekly
Novelist and former Baltimore Evening Sun reporter Massey (The Salaryman's Wife) takes readers on a thoughtful tour of contemporary Japanese youth culture in this accomplished murder mystery. Rei Shimura is a Japanese-American antiques dealer who, looking to supplement her income, has begun writing a column for the Gaijin Times, Tokyo's English-language newspaper. When the paper's owner decides to transform the publication from a conventional news outlet to a comic book magazine, Shimura gets what is, for her, an unwanted assignment--to write an article on the history and culture of manga, or Japanese comic books. The newspaper asks Rika Fuchida, an ambitious student intern, to assist her, but Shimura prefers the assistance of her new boyfriend, Takeo Kayama. With his help, she discovers Mars Girl--a manga that follows the adventures of a superhero who, like Shimura, is bicultural (half-Martian, half-Japanese)--and the Showa Story, in which the superhero travels back in time, to 1930s Japan. Determined to keep her job at the newspaper, Shimura pursues Mars Girl's creator, Kunio Takahashi, in both the hip and the less-than-savory sides of Tokyo. Things begin to get shady, however, when Shimura is injured falling down a flight of stairs (was she pushed?) and when one of Takahashi's friends turns up dead, dressed as Mars Girl, in a river. Shimura begins to suspect that she is being followed, not only by her "assistant," the ambitious intern, but also by gangsters. Deftly sketching everyday life in parts of Tokyo rarely seen by tourists, Massey tells a series of overlapping stories about identity, the popular media and the hilarious frenzy of contemporary comic book culture. Agents, Ellen Geiger and Dave Barbor at Curtis Brown. (May)
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.
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The fourth entry in Massey's series starring Rei Shimura, a Japanese American antiques dealer living in Tokyo, maintains the high standards of its predecessors. Just as
The Flower Master provided an in-depth look at the Japanese art of flower arranging, this novel explores the Japanese fascination with animation, or
manga. In her new position with a Japanese magazine for foreigners, Rei writes about antiques--until the boss assigns her a story on manga. As Rei enters the secretive world of manga, where people dress up as their favorite characters, a man she talks to is murdered. One of the manga artists, who may hold the answers, is missing. With her wry humor and her multicultural background, Rei is one of the most complex female protagonists around. She is Japanese, but she is also an American living in Japan, and this dichotomy gives her observations on Japanese culture a fascinating double edge. Another must-read from an author who has honed the skill of captivating and educating her readers at the same time.
Jenny McLarinCopyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved
--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
