Dale Furutani: Jade Palace Vendetta
William Morrow. ISBN 0-688-15818-8
Honor, loyalty, fidelity — these virtues often have little meaning in today’s hurlyburly modern world. In feudal Japan however, they served as the cornerstones of a code by which men and women lived and died.
Matsuyama Kaze, noble ronin and fascinating protagonist of Jade Palace Vendetta, epitomizes all of these virtues and more. While seeking his lord’s missing daughter, Kaze saves a merchant from a savage group of bandits. This act of compassion leads him into a dangerous landscape of deceit and violence.
Nothing is what it seems, and Kaze soon finds himself trapped in a treacherous maze of lies, villainy and murder. Only Kaze’s razor-sharp wit and superb martial skills can help him navigate a narrow path between a vicious gang and an iron-willed matriarch determined to find her missing son regardless of cost.
Jade Palace Vendetta draws the reader in from the first page and doesn’t let go until the tense ending. Elder Grandma, matriarch of the Noguchi family (cadet branch); Hishigawa, a rich, venal merchant; Enomoto, deadly captain of guards; Yuchan, Hishigawa’s wife and Elder Grandma’s granddaughter; and most of all Matsuyama Kaze himself came to vividly to life as the reader follows Kaze down the Tokaido road. Dale Furutani transported me so completely into ancient Japan, that when I looked up from my book I was surprised not to see rice paper walls and straw tatamis.
This is mystery writing at its finest. I’m impatiently waiting till the next book when I can step on that dusty road and travel with Kaze again.
Teri Smith
Raising hell for fifty years from Alaska to the Azores and all points in between, Teri Smith (nee Dohmen) was an Air Force brat who never stopped traveling. She was also a mother, a grandmother (of ten!), a help desk wizard, a financial assistant, acquisitions editor for Samhain Publishing and, most importantly, the Queen Nag of the Known Universe. A multi-published short story writer, her first novel, With Nine You Get Vanyr, written with Jean Marie Ward, was published in 2007. Contrary to common belief, she never stopped living.