Green Roses [Paperback]

Thomas Boggs (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: December 11, 2002

Two boys from two very different cultures; Tim Glade, an American high school boy living on a U.S. military base in Japan, and Satoru Watanabe, a Japanese boy of the same age, living just outside the perimeter fence. The time is the early 1970s, at the height of the Vietnam War, when anti-U.S. demonstrations were rife throughout Japan. As the boys' forbidden friendship blossoms and develops into something more passionate, their cultural and racial differences only add a headier spice to their relationship. But can their dangerous intimacy survive the disapproval of the world they live in?

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Thomas Boggs was born in Iwakuni, Japan to an American serviceman father and a Japanese mother. He has spent most of his life in Tokyo, where he presently lives and works. He is the author of Tokyo Vanilla.

Product Details

• Paperback: 192 pages
• Publisher: iUniverse (December 11, 2002)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0595261493
• ISBN-13: 978-0595261499
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 6 x 0.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 10.4 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 2.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #4,421,583 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

0 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars First Thomas Boggs Book, October 26, 2006

A Kid's Review

This review is from: Green Roses (Paperback)

(ending kind of given away)

So I found out about Thomas Boggs through pure chance, and immediately wanted to read one of his books. Green Roses was cheaper than his other novel, Tokyo Vanilla, so I took a chance, and...

Disappointment.


The ending was very, very abrupt, and the entire novel is completely centric on the main character's feelings, as if his entire family didn't even exist. Tim (main character) also has some kind of...personality change...around the middle, which I'm sure was explained somewhere within the oh-so-complex storyline...

Did I say 'complex'? I meant simple and there for a sole purpose; sex. There wasn't much emotional content unless you could read it from the physical description, which wouldn't have been a problem if the characters had about five times as much depth. I will say that the steamy scenes are moderately hot, but there isn't enough of a 'story' to balance it out. Green Roses, in my opinion, is borderlining on being smut.

THAT would have been fine with me as well, but it didnt' begin like that at all. In fact, I was expecting it to be a great novel from the way the book began. Then it was just like Boggs decided to...stop. On the better hand, it's definitely fanfiction material, the kind of book that someone else could have really brought into a brilliant light.

Yes, a light that would have focused more on the emotions of the other characters, maybe. Like how did Tim's mother feel when word was getting around camp that he was seeing a Japanese boy? Or Doug's (the 'friend') behavior around Tim after he started to hear the rumors? Or SATORU, MAYBE, AFTER HE DECIDED TO NEVER SEE TIM AGAIN?!

Just a disappointing, depressing novel. Full of possibilities, but they all died when Boggs said 'nah...'. Good read if you want some quick smut and an ending that tried a little too hard to be 'tragic', bad read if you're looking for something to READ. If you can buy it cheap, give it a try, but be cautioned.