Japanese gangsters--the Yukuza--make up the biggest, richest, and most secretive organized crime syndicates in the world. The combined Yakuza is ten times larger than the American mafia, with profits that would rival any Fortune 500 company. Written in the tradition of Nicholas Pileggi's Wiseguy, Seymour's Yakuza Diary infiltrates the Yakuza, presenting the details of a world that, until now, has remained modern Japan's dirty little secret.
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Book Description
Editorial Reviews
Amazon.com Review
In the spring of 1993, freelance writer Christopher Seymour talked his way out of the grasp of a suspicious immigration official just in time to extend his stay in Japan during a countrywide yakuza (organized crime) gang war. From the opening pages of Yakuza Diary, his lighthearted enthusiasm is infectious. As he works his way into the yakuza network of physically imposing men with full-body tattoos and a weakness for tacky golf clothes, Seymour has adventures both scary and farcical. And he collects a slew of revealing details. For example, Seymour tells us that part of the affected romance of the hugely successful and influential Japanese underworld is that they style themselves as losers: ya-ku-za literally means 8-9-3, a losing hand in an old-fashioned Japanese card game. The Village Voice writes, "Christopher Seymour's journey into Japan's netherworld is alternately funny and harrowing, and always thoroughly original. His self-effacing style makes the perfect foil for this fascinating guided tour of institutional crime and ritualized violence."
From Publishers Weekly
Based on taped conversations and journal entries made during three months in 1993 when Seymour, an American freelance journalist, interviewed Japanese gangsters, this report makes no claim to objectivity or exhaustiveness. But it is a revealing glimpse of mob influence on Japanese society. Although their operations are not dissimilar to those of the mafia elsewhere, local legend has it that the yakusa are several times as large as their American counterparts, vastly wealthy and powerful in politics, the stock market, drugs, gambling, prostitution and other legitimate and illegitimate businesses. In one interview, a yakusa boss describes how his gang dispossessed the tenants of buildings that some real estate developers wanted to replace with parking lots. Other interviewees discuss mob hierarchies, their clients and their views on violence. Seymour gives a colorful account of his informers and their molls, many of them foreign women, and of the more ordinary life and ambience of Tokyo. He is amusing about his troubles as a long-haired foreigner whose business card lacked the requisite company connection, which in Japan establishes one's status and legitimacy. World rights: Atlantic Monthly Press.
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc.
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc.
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
iidesu ne!,
By emuboy (Los Angeles,CA United States) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Yakuza Diary: Doing Time in the Japanese Underworld (Hardcover)
Absolutely fascinating. Seymour manages to become friends with the most interesting and unorthodox crime group in the world without glorifying them. He meets with all kinds of people in the yakuza, from an Aizu Kotetsu newcomer to a Yamaguchi-gumi oyabun. I read it all in one night. yondekudasai!
2 of 3 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Christopher Seymour has guts to go this far,
This review is from: Yakuza Diary: Doing Time in the Japanese Underworld (Hardcover)
Christopher Seymour wrote an exciting book. He lived with the Yakuza and actually worked for the Yakuza in order to create this great piece of fun to read literature. I greatly admire him for doing this dangerous job. Everybody who wants to know about the hidden vital organs of Japanese society should read this book. Just to get an impression of how the organs work.
1 of 2 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
The stuff that Japanese people won't tell you about,
By A Customer
This review is from: Yakuza Diary: Doing Time in the Japanese Underworld (Hardcover)
A really good easy read. If you live in Japan this book is a must. Impress your friends with your knowlage of the Japanese underworld. A very interesting book. You'll never eat a bowl of ramen with the same gaijin inosence.
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