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Wholly satisfying novel about a a rigid, conventional British lawyer sent to work in Japan, about which he neither knows nor cares to learn anything. The story's narrated by a co-worker & that it is, is in large part the reason for the book's being so good;,

This isn't another book about culture shock but about the protagonist rolled into decline by a status-obssessed young woman. He seems at first rather pathetic, then as more involved in life than, probably, ever before and. then, surprisingly, offensive and obnoxious. Although the narrator troubles to treat Meadowlark (that name is the ony objectionable thing in the book) kindly he;s more the mildly-interested observer, uninvolved in his co-worker's life and so the reader too can show more coolly observe events even as s/he notices hints of the one's staid background and the other's openness to his new surroundings and perhaps in the end wonder whether Meadowlark unconsciouly used the foreign surroundings as an excuse to behave badly.

Whenever I laid the book down I was soon looking forward to picking it up again. God knows it's not every book you can say that about. show less