Japan News and Discussion
Book Reviews › 05:25 AM JST - 19th November
Late last month, the World Economic Forum released its annual Global Gender Gap Index, which ranks countries on how equitably they divide resources and opportunities…
Book Reviews › 03:35 AM JST - 15th November
Sarah Palin's new memoir describes heart-wrenching anguish about her teen daughter's pregnancy playing out before a national audience. But the 413-page tome doesn't contain a…
Book Reviews › 03:45 AM JST - 8th November
Any foreigner who’s been in Japan for a while can tell you that there’s a lot of ups and downs to living life out here.…
Book Reviews › 05:14 AM JST - 3rd November
No matter how long you've been studying the language, no matter how many words you've memorized, it seems you never stop wondering, "How do I…
Book Reviews › 03:10 AM JST - 29th October
"Just Enough" is a book of stories and sketches, depictions of vanished ways of life told from the point of view of a contemporary observer.…
Book Reviews › 03:58 AM JST - 22nd October
Hirotaka Adachi was just 17 years old when he had his first story published. “Summer, Fireworks, and My Corpse” was the grisly tale of a…
Book Reviews › 03:15 AM JST - 20th October
Anime producer, author and "otaku" expert Toshio Okada hit the big time when he published "Itsumademo Debu to Omouna yo" (Don’t Think You’ll Be Fat…
Book Reviews › 03:11 AM JST - 18th October
Despite its reputation as Tokyo’s leading youth-fashion hub, the 109 shopping complex in Shibuya can be a forbidding place for foreigners. Wall-to-wall teenyboppers and floor…
Book Reviews › 05:49 AM JST - 16th October
Japanese food and manga must be two of the country’s most successful exports, but they’re not the most obvious of bedfellows. However, an unorthodox cookbook…
Book Reviews › 07:29 AM JST - 14th October
A journalist is supposed to observe and report his story, not become part of it. But by the time Jake Adelstein found himself face to…
Book Reviews › 06:50 AM JST - 10th October
Noriko Sakai, 38, the singer and actress who goes on trial on Oct 26 for possession of drugs and stimulant use, is the subject of…
Book Reviews › 02:19 PM JST - 6th October
A record of the daily lives of Ainu people living in the Tokyo metropolitan area has been published as a photo collection. Around 160 photos…
Book Reviews › 04:41 AM JST - 2nd October
There’s no shortage of writers who have picked up literary awards for their debut novels. Far rarer are the ones who have had a new…
Book Reviews › 04:24 AM JST - 20th September
David Peace is a tough bugger to enjoy. His prose is knotty, claustrophobic, obsessive to the point of monomania: constantly repeating, repeating, full of endless…
Book Reviews › 03:00 AM JST - 15th September
How many times have you heard people talking about finding a “good school” for their kids? But what exactly does “good” mean? Is it a…
Book Reviews › 05:38 AM JST - 10th September
Familiar scenario: you’re going to be marooned on an island and you can only bring X number of books with you. If that island happens…
Book Reviews › 06:13 AM JST - 7th September
A new book bringing fresh insights into the death of Tokyo hostess Lucie Blackman has been written by London-based journalist Clare Campbell. She was able…
Book Reviews › 01:04 PM JST - 3rd September
In a posthumous memoir, Massachusetts Sen Edward M Kennedy writes of fear and remorse surrounding the fateful events on Chappaquiddick Island in 1969, when his…
Book Reviews › 05:40 AM JST - 26th August
In Lonely Planet's guide to Tokyo, Kabukicho and the neighboring Golden Gai are accorded one paragraph each. Those wanting to know more about what is…
Book Reviews › 05:41 AM JST - 20th August
Rahmat Shigeru Ono enjoyed his dinner of fried noodles, mixed sauteed vegetables and a spicy boiled egg. For decades, in fact, for most of his…