Kodansha International imprint: 13 books
by Shoko Tendo;Louise Heal
Language: English
Release Date: April 1, 2009
Language: English
Release Date: April 1, 2009
Born to a wealthy and powerful yakuza boss, Shoko Tendo lived the early years of her life in luxury. However, when she was six, everything changed: her father was jailed, and the family fell into debt. Bullied by her classmates because of her father's activities, and terrorized at home by her father,...
Taiko
An Epic Novel of War and Glory in Feudal Japan
Language: English
Release Date: August 3, 2012
In the tempestuous closing decades of the sixteenth century, the Empire of Japan writhes in chaos as the shogunate crumbles and rival warlords battle for supremacy. Warrior monks in their armed citadels block the road to the capital; castles are destroyed, villages plundered, fields put to the torch.
Amid...
by Dr. Junichi Saga
Language: English
Release Date: August 5, 2010
Language: English
Release Date: August 5, 2010
This is the true story, as told to the doctor who looked after him just before he died, of the life of one of the last traditional yakuza in Japan. It wasn’t a "good" life, in either sense of the word, but it was an adventurous one; and the tale he has to tell presents an honest and oddly...
Bushido
The Soul of Japan
Language: English
Release Date: August 5, 2010
A century ago, when Japan was transforming itself from an isolated feudal society into a modern nation, a Japanese educator queried about the ethos of his people composed this seminal work, which with his numerous other writings in English made him the best, known Japanese writer in the West during...
The Essence of Shinto
Japan's Spiritual Heart
Language: English
Release Date: August 5, 2010
In The Essence of Shinto, revered Shinto master Motohisa Yamakage explains the core values of Shinto and explores both basic tenets and its more esoteric points in terms readily accessible to the modern Western reader. He shows how the long history of Shintoism is deeply woven into the fabric of Japanese...
All About Particles
A Handbook of Japanese Function Words
Language: English
Release Date: August 5, 2010
Students of Japanese are familiar with the term "particle," and realize that they, like English prepositions, require a special effort to master. This handbook provides all the information one would need on these tricky units of grammar.
All About Particles covers more than 70 particles...
Musashi
An Epic Novel of the Samurai Era
Language: English
Release Date: August 10, 2012
The classic samurai novel about the real exploits of the most famous swordsman.
Miyamoto Musashi was the child of an era when Japan was emerging from decades of civil strife. Lured to the great Battle of Sekigahara in 1600 by the hope of becoming a samurai--without really knowing what it meant--he...
Seppuku
A History of Samurai Suicide
Language: English
Release Date: November 20, 2012
The history of seppuku -- Japanese ritual suicide by cutting the stomach, sometimes referred to as hara-kiri -- spans a millennium, and came to be favored by samurai as an honorable form of death. Here, for the first time in English, is a book that charts the history of seppuku from ancient times...
Totto-Chan
The Little Girl at the Window
Language: English
Release Date: March 23, 2012
This engaging series of childhood recollections tells about an ideal school in Tokyo during World War II that combined learning with fun, freedom, and love. This unusual school had old railroad cars for classrooms, and it was run by an extraordinary man-its founder and headmaster, Sosaku Kobayashi--who...
Japanese Core Words and Phrases
Things You Can't Find in a Dictionary
Language: English
Release Date: August 19, 2015
Some Japanese words and phrases, even though they lie at the core of the language, forever elude the student's grasp. They are not explained satisfactorily in dictionaries or textbooks for the simple reason that they cannot be conveniently defined. Japanese Core Words and Phrases brings these recalcitrants...
Eat Sleep Sit
My Year at Japan's Most Rigorous Zen Temple
Language: English
Release Date: August 5, 2010
At the age of thirty, Kaoru Nonomura left his family, his girlfriend, and his job as a designer to undertake a year of ascetic training at Eiheiji, one of the most rigorous Zen training temples in Japan. This book is Nonomura's account of his experiences. He skillfully describes every aspect of training,...
by Masuji Ibuse
Language: English
Release Date: August 5, 2010
Language: English
Release Date: August 5, 2010
Black Rain is centered around the story of a young woman who was caught in the radioactive "black rain" that fell after the bombing of Hiroshima. lbuse bases his tale on real-life diaries and interviews with victims of the holocaust; the result is a book that is free from sentimentality...
Where is the Justice?
Media Attacks, Prosecutorial Abuse, and My 13 Years in Japanese Court
Language: English
Release Date: August 5, 2010
On June 19, 1988, the Asahi Shimbun newspaper broke the story: Recruit Co. Ltd, a media conglomerate founded by Hiromasa Ezoe, was alleged to have bribed the deputy Mayor of Kawasaki City. Thus began what became known as the Recruit Affair, a scandal that shook Japanese politics to the core, just...