The Sexual Occupation of Japan

by Richard Setlowe

Book Overview

Attorney Peter Saxon arrives in Tokyo to secretly negotiate a historic business merger, but the government official he was scheduled to meet is gruesomely murdered. Saxon becomes the target of strange... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0060183934
• ISBN13: 9780060183936
• Release Date: July 1999
• Publisher: HarperCollins Publishers
• Length: 309 Pages
• Weight: 1.30 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.1" x 6.5" x 9.6"

Customer Reviews

Flickscribble Plus

A very good read to clear out those cobwebs induced by your almost futile attempts to complete Gibbon's "Decline and Fall". Have you noticed how many "novels" today are really just screenplays without the stage directions? I believe the term in Hollywood is a "treatment". They're really storylines looking for producers, so they don't have to be real novels. Only in our fast paced, dizzyingly visual, special effects laden culture could this work be called a novel. I mean if the movie "Bullet" were shot today, all of it would be edited to look like the chase scene it's so justly famous for. (Ah, the curse of those early music videos!)So I hereby designate this genre, affectionately, "Flickscribble". And this book is a much better evocation of the genre than most and justifies the four stars above. Just don't call it a "novel".

The Sexual Occupation of Japan

I found strengths in all five of the previous reviews of this novel. Yet, I tend toward seeing the book and valuable and entertaining despite its flaws.My son is stationed at Atsugi, which is one of the U.S. bases featured in the book. My wife and I just went for visit, and we've been to Japan before. We love the country and are comfortable there. We feel a connection to the people. Moreover, my brother served in the Navy in the 60s and had some of the Japanese service experiences reflected in the book, and some of the adults I knew as a child echoed some of the stories seen in Setlowe's novel about the period immediately after the War.Setlowe's book is complicated and has racist, shallow elements but cannot be dismissed as racist and shallow. I rejected as implausible some of the story elements, yet was entertained nonetheless. We spent several days on this trip with my son's Japanese girlfriend and found it interesting where we could venture with her in conversations and where we could not. Some of Setlowe's take on the strains and social problems of these relationships is on target and reflect his own experiences. That is not racism, not does Setlowe see the Japanese as inferior due to cultural straitjackets. I do not see the "sexual occupation" aspect as important a motivating force in Japanese business activities or closed market pyschology as Setlowe seems to, but it is a factor, a continuing factor that Japan must face.In the end, Japan is not just one of the World's most successful nations, it is one of the most complicated. I feel that Setlowe was aware of this and that Zen, and other aspects of Japanese culture are deep and difficult to master, yet things one cannot reject or skip over. He made an effort not to ignore them. Maybe it could have been stronger, but the author clearly was writing as much with affection and interest as he was with criticism.

Haunting past meets present in exciting thriller .

The Sexual Occupation of Japan is an entertaining novel that cleverly weaves the past and present with a unique perspective of history. The plot has the main character trying to put together the "deal of the millenium" but something from his past keeps trying to sabotage it. He does not know if it is his past or Japan's revenge for Americans'past actions that is out for him. This story is a thriller, love story and action all rolled into one. It is a story of how honor, love, sense of obligation and fear will change and channel one's life. It is a story with laughs, fear and tears with a climax ending that will keep your guessing. If you want a story that has it all, read this novel.

A haunting, literate thriller for grown-ups

Like Setlowe's earlier novels, this story treats the reader to a smooth blending of history, information and romance. What sets this new novel apart, however, is its timely exploration of East/West politics, its haunting evocation of the folly and bravery of another era, and its wisdom in delineating the ways in which the past and present interweave. Vivid characters abound, whose lives and ultimate destinies become important to the reader. Similar in ambition to "Snow Falling On Cedars," this novel provides a rich, literate reading experience for grown-ups. Great title, too.

Understanding the post WWII Japanese attitude to Big Brother

While some readers will dwell on the similiarities to Crichton's "Rising Sun" or links to Golden's "Memoirs of a Geisha", this reader enjoyed Setlowe's theory of Japanese economic revenge for past transgressions, both sexual and incendiary. The status of tall blonde women as the consorts to high rolling businessmen, the fierce feudal exclusion of foreign investments and the trophy like acquisition of high profile American icons, are the brush strokes of culture with a patient but relentless memory.That memory is selective, as we are reminded, the vanquished were once brutal transgressors. The same people who shun the mixed breed offspring of their occupation, fail to recognize their responsibility to the victims of the sexual imprisonment of thousands of Dutch and Chinese women during WWII.Through the eyes of Peter Saxon, a Hollywood lawyer with a twisted past, we see the business side of Japan today. Caught between the memories of the past and the forgiveness of the future, are strong emotions which stand in the way of a merger which will revolutionize the entertainment industry. A middle aged Saxon must cope with the intricities of negociations where "no" is meant but never spoken and the haunting presence of a past love and trauma, experienced thirty five years earlier when he flew Navy missions from Japan into Vietnam.A little suspension of reality is called for, but otherwise a non-stop thriller of immense enjoyment.