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9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
It had to happen sooner or later, March 24, 2003
Even the best authors write at least one book that's not quite up to their usually excellent standard. Let me start with stating, that i am a devoted fan of Massey's work, and her heroine Rei Shimura. The next installment in the series chronicling Rei's mis-/adventures as a struggling antiques dealer and reluctant sleuth is always an eagerly awaited pleasure for me. That said i must confess i was a bit disappionted by this, the latest volume. As has been stated by some of the other reviewers, what makes Masseys books such a treat isn't so much the cases themselves, as the fascinating glimpses she gives us of life in japan (as experienced by a westener) and japanese culture in general. Since The Samurai's Daughter for a large part plays in San Francisco i had already resigned myself to my 'nippon fix' being somewhat diluted, but what was offered was even less than i had feared. Don't get me wrong, it's great to find out a bit more about the Shimura family and Rei's pre japan life, but i'm afraid it isn't interesting enough to occupy half a book with i'm afraid. Still this would be forgiveable, would it serve as set up for Rei's return to japan, and were the crime investigated truly engrossing, but unfortunately neither is the case. The end of the story sees Rei back where she started from, unlikely to return to her home of choice before the end of the next book, and the 'case', never Masseys strong suit, is i'm afraid an utter, incoherent mess, that completely failed to grip me (it's finally 'solved', if you will call it that, not so much through logical deduction, but rather a chain of lucky coincidences and the elimination of all other possible suspects aka authorial handwaving). Massey can do, and in the past has done, _much_ better. About Rei's 'great epiphany', that belonging to a particular nationality/race doesn't automatically make you a virtous, better human being, and that the japanese people, like everybody else, are made up of individuals, both good and bad, the less said the better. In conclusion it's a book for Massey's fans(and i will definitely buy the next one, and the one after that, and...), but newcomers should start with her earlier works, and, if Rei is their kind of sleuth, buy this volume once it comes out in paperback.
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7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Another Winner from Massey, September 4, 2003
This latest in the delightful Rei Shimura series finds our intrepid Japanese-American once again up to her delicate neck in mystery and mayhem--with a bit of intrigue and a lot of love interest thrown in. Stuck with her parents in their San Francisco homestead, Rei is in turn pleased to be spoiled, and chafing under the bit to get back to her privacy in Japan. But she has a strange house guest, a native Japanese student, to contend with--as well as the ardent courtship of her long-time boyfriend, the sexy Scots lawyer Hugh Glendinning. While contending with the usual East-West contradictions of her everyday life, Rei is contenting herself with researching and writing her family's history. But she uncovers more than she bargained for when it turns out that her grandfather actually tutored Emperor Hirohito--and may have been part of a right-wing Japanese political group that fostered the ultimate events of World War II. Now Rei has to face the Japan of the War, and contrast it with the modern-day Japan, her much-beloved adopted country--and the country of her father. Add to that the top-secret case that Hugh is working on, which concerns reparations for Japanese war crimes, and one gets an idea of Rei's state of mind. For the first time, she becomes distant from her father and her family as she searches her soul for who she really is. The answer is there, and always has been, for the enchanted reader to see--and when Rei ultimately finds herself, there is a wonderful treat in store for her and for us.
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7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
Moderately Diverting, March 9, 2003
The joy I get out of reading this author's series of mysteries is mainly from the exotic nature of the Japanese culture and the California-native Rei's interactions within it. This book (and the last one) take place mostly in the US. So my joy is muted. I do get pleasure out of learning a lot more about the main character's father and mother and of some of her past life (before living in Japan). As I *am* a San Francisco Bay Area native, the local SF scenes and characters didn't really ring true for me. I don't think the author captured us all that well. It's always more interesting to encounter the alien than the familiar for me as a reader (so maybe I am bit biased? Blase?). I hope the next book (I surely hope there's one or two more) will again take place in the unfamiliar territory (to me) of Japan. I have always enjoyed the comedic aspects of the interactions of a foreigner who looks like native yet still is "gaijin" no matter how hard she tries to fit into the Japanese culture. Would she have been more Japanese if she had a Japanese mother than a Japanese Father? So my girlfriend asks me while I type.
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