Elizabeth Clare Johnson 2008-11-09

0 of 0 people found the following review helpful:

I loved this mystery! I went on to read every single one that has come
after it. Dry sense of humor, interesting characters. She also has an
interesting love life that seems as complex as the mysteries.

Ninja Bookworm 2008-07-29

0 of 0 people found the following review helpful:

Wow, if this book won the Agatha Award, there must not have been much competition that year. This is the kind of book that makes me want to fling it across that room after only a few pages, due to the very bad writing. (And it's just not the writing, some obvious mistakes were overlooked by the editor). I realize this is not high literature, but to me, such bad writing calls attention to itself, making it impossible for me to suspend disbelief.

For starters, there are pages of nonsensical dialogue (I imagine that the author must have been typing away at these pages when she was about to nod off.) I finished them and think, Huh? What? What does this have to do with anything? The author's thinking/writing at times seems confused and confusing.

And then there are mini-lessons about Japan (the language and culture.) Though I don't mind this--in fact, I read such books to experience a different culture--they are so clunkily inserted, not blended into the narrative in any sort of natural way. It's seems that the author feels, "OK, now I will give you the reader a short lesson on..." I recently finished reading all the books in the John Rain series (Barry Eisler); though this is a slightly different genre, Eisler skillfully weaves into the narrative things about Japan. I feel I am experiencing a different culture (without receiving a mini-lesson.) Like the Rain series and Japan, I also feel the same about the No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency series and Africa (I feel immersed in Africa, without noticing that the author has made me feel that way through skillful writing.)

And then some glaring mistakes. (1) A character orders cheese sandwiches. A waitress brings cheese sandwiches. People eat cheese sandwiches. A couple of pages later, a waitress brings cheese sandwiches (again!?). (2) A character chops green onions and mushrooms, sautees them, makes an omelet, and cuts the omelet into three pieces. People eat the omelet. A few pages later, the character is chopping green onions and mushrooms (preparing to make the omelet???). (3) The occasional missing (left) quotation mark. So at the end of the paragraph, upon discovering the right quotation mark, I backtrack to figure out what the character actually said, and/or what she thought, since it's not clear where I (yes, the reader is given this task) should insert the first/left missing quotation mark. (4) And then, a character invites another person to join her (but does not say where she plans on going), and the second person makes the non sequitur, "But I shouldn't eat cake." But the first character never mentioned anything about cake. And a few pages later, the first character is going to a place to eat cake. Either (a) the second character has ESP, or (b) the author made a mistake. Due to the past obvious mistakes, I have to choose (b). These are only a few examples, but they drastically decreased my belief in the author's ability to write a novel. I just couldn't believe it and just didn't care about the stock, flat characters.

But, as this is the author's first novel, maybe they have gotten better. I really wanted to like this novel, as I am interested in Japan and like reading mysteries.

Lovebooks 2008-01-27

0 of 0 people found the following review helpful:

I hate to be negative because my husband and I had such high hopes for this book. We had read interviews with the author and thought that since we live in Japan we could really relate to the places and characters. What a horrible disappointment! I won't tear it apart but there wasn't much to recommend Japan in this book. First of all the Tokyo Weekender is not a magazine that anybody spends more than 5 minutes on. It is just a little 15 or 20 page advertising insert in the newspaper which has a couple of 8 paragraph fluff pieces. Ms. Massey must have worked for them because she seemed obsess with mentioning the paper every 20 pages or so. I don't know ANYBODY who reads it. It's a joke. There are more substantial publications in Japan. I could never figure out why Rei said she would never leave Tokyo when she is so miserable. She didn't have anything good to say about the Japanese or foreign people she came into contact with nor with her life in general. And I can't understand how two English teachers sharing a crappy apartment in a crappy neighborhood act like they are starving to death. To give you a little perspective, each of them wouldn't be paying more than 40000 Yen a month in rent and their income would be at least 250000 Yen a month. Most English teachers earn more. This feigned poverty was pretty irritating to me. But I digress

My real problem is that there are so many errors. Minor ones I can overlook but I think to make a mistake in the actual sequence of events in a mystery is unforgivable. I can't go into detail but if you are a stickler for accuracy then this will drive you crazy. Without giving away the plot, how did the killer find out both places where the granddaughter worked and even what her name was? The killer describes seeing a victim and the circumstances under which the victim was killed that are impossible to have occurred from a time line perspective. There are more but I can't give much away. It was pretty obvious by page 85 who the killer was. I don't mind if you want to make it easy to solve the crime and then just build up the characters, but there was nothing here.

If these kinds of things don't bother you then read it. My husband (who is Japanese) enjoyed it. He never analyzes a mystery too much and never tries to solve it. I, on the other hand, am a stickler for accuracy.

Leizel Jackson 2007-06-08

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

This book is interesting, and a light read.

The Tokyo setting had its good and bad points.
The Good: I enjoyed the fact that it was set in Tokyo, I am quite familiar with the city, and it was nice to read about places I've been to or heard about.
The Bad: On the other hand, I did not like her representation of Japanese people. Every single one of her Japanese characters made some negative comment about foreigners, even people who were her friends and family (who probably would not continually say, "Since you are a foreigner, you would not know this..."). Also most of her female Japanese characters were very catty, although to be honest, basically every female character looks down on Rei. Mariko, the woman Rei feels compelled to help protect is such a brat that I didn't care what happened to her.

The mystery itself is interesting, although fairly easy to figure out. The clues are not very subtle.

Overall, I liked the book. I'll read more in the series when I want a light read. However, I hope that people who have never been to Japan will not think that this book is an accurate representation of Japanese people.

Sakuteiki 2007-02-15

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Rei: I love luxury, forsaking it is what I'm most proud of.

The Salaryman's Wife is about 21st Century Japanese Samurai: the Japanese mafia called Yakusa and the Ya-San's junior motorcycle gang Bosuzoku, their Geisha Samurai consort bar girls and Rei Shimura a formidable Samurai woman strong-minded self-confident loyal.

Rei Shimura moves from California to Tokyo at age 24 because of her passion for Japan, it`s people culture folk art and antiques. Through 8 books the illiterate (cannot read kanji) antique buyer Rei progresses to age 30 solving mysteries of murder and Japanese culture along the way. The Salaryman's Wife is #1 and like the first Nero Wolf, displays all the eccentricities defining its repertory cast.

Rei is konketsujin, a denigrating appellation for half blood Japanese.

Rei's mother is a sexy blond Baltimore socialite interior decorator with a penchant for designer clothes, her father a Japanese University of California psychiatrist. Her parents live in the toney hills of San Francisco and want nothing more than to lavish all their attention and money on their only child. However Rei's heart is drawn to Japan where her Samurai blood seeks self-support and self-sufficiency, rejecting the comfortable luxury her parents offer.

In Tokyo Rei's Auntie Nori Shimura, cousins physician Tom and collegian Chika offer Rei family sanctuary and refuge which she rejects. Her father's brother, a traditional salaryman, works in another city and visits home only occasionally.

Through each book the reader learns Japanese language, as in the 5 disc DVD Shogun with Richard Chamberlain, as well as culture and prejudice. The murder takes place in a minshuku family run inn of Shiroyama, origin of Shunkei carving. The town is the site of ghost stories about Samurai Princess Miyo Shiroyama who failed at seppuku ritual suicide in the 1800s and continues to roam the surrounding forests.

Rei's experiences of Japanese prejudice as an American, as konketsujin, is a mirror image of the Chinese woman in the Joy Luck Club. Rei's Samurai refusal to accept dependency is similar to the matriarchal Chinese ethnic tribe Muoso where women accept a man informally in a "walking marriage" and walk away if he displeases her.

A wealthy fashion conscious Japanese trophy wife Setsuko Nakamura dies at the minshuku over the New Year holiday and Rei discovers that lies return to haunt even decades later, and sexual repression wreaks harm in the cross fire of hormonal drive and fantasy.

The entire 8 book series is a thoughtful journey through Zen Buddhism, the mixed parentage pregnancies of war and occupation, and a passion for self determination. Highly recommended.