Review by Booklist Review
Fans of that special subset of spy thriller that grafts psychic wounds onto a James Bond^-style secret agent cum hit man will find Eisler's first novel right up their dark alley. Hero John Rain makes his living orchestrating the deaths of government officials so they look natural; the first hit in the novel shows Rain planting a microchip on the back of his target, a public works director, in the middle of a crowded Tokyo subway train--the microchip orders the man's pacemaker to malfunction. Rain, as the reader learns over and over again throughout the book, is isolated and alienated--he is ainoko, a mix of American and Japanese parents, and is traumatized by his "half-breed" status and by his experiences in Vietnam and Cambodia. The book is weak in characterizationRain is a Bond without charm or depth, whiningly adolescent in his constant reiteration of his problems. But plot and procedure are real standouts here. Rain's killing of the government worker leads him to a coven of agents trying to extract explosive information from the worker's beautiful daughter. And Eisler provides plenty of fascinating detail about the new technologies involved in secret-agent tracking and surveillance. A perfect subway read for spy-story addicts. --Connie Fletcher
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
Set in a memorable noir version of Tokyo (jazz clubs, whiskey bars, "love hotels"), Eisler's rich and atmospheric debut thriller winds its way around the city's extensive rail system and its upscale Western boutiques Mulberry, Paul Stuart, Nicole Farhi London, Le Ciel Bleu, J.M. Weston. The author an American lawyer who has lived and worked in Japan brings to life a complex and most interesting hero: John Rain, a hard and resourceful man in his 40s with an American mother, a Japanese father, a childhood spent in both countries and a stretch with Special Operations in Vietnam that literally made him what he is today a highly paid freelance assassin. The book begins with Rain arranging the death (on the subway) of a prominent government figure by short-circuiting his pacemaker and making it look like the man died of a heart attack. But Rain's relatively simple life suddenly becomes very complicated when he finds himself involved both romantically and professionally with the dead man's lovely daughter, Midori, a talented jazz pianist. Formidable adversaries a nasty CIA agent from John's Vietnam days; a right-wing guru who uses Shinto priests as spies and yakuza gangsters as enforcers; a tireless old cop seem intent on exposing Rain and eliminating Midori. There are several excellent action scenes, an amusing and touching young computer nerd who is Rain's only reliable ally and, most of all, an intriguing and intimate evocation of Japan's intense love-hate relationship with America. (July 22) Forecast: Widespread international interest in Eisler's debut (rights have been sold in Brazil, France, Germany, Holland, Italy, Japan, Norway, Sweden and the U.K.) indicates the cosmopolitan appeal of the book; a blurb from James Ellroy suggests its popular potential. This could be the first installment in a hit series Eisler is already working on a sequel. (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Review by Library Journal Review
Picked by the publisher's sales reps as a favorite title of the season and already sold to nine foreign publishers, this debut would seem to have plenty of promise. Protagonist John Rain, of mixed Japanese and American descent, leads a quiet life in Tokyo that masks his real work as a hired assassin. (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Review by Kirkus Book Review
Rich atmosphere and believable politics in a distinguished debut thriller. John Rain is a half-American, half-Japanese hit-man for unseen masters in Tokyo, where he passes for a native, though he knows he'll never completely belong. He has gotten rich by providing elegant eliminations of problem individuals for well-heeled, anonymous purchasers of his "consulting" service. The cold-bloodedness required for this chilling career comes from some very nasty experiences as a member of an American dirty-deeds outfit in Vietnam and from his childhood as an outsider, first in his father's Japan and then in his mother's America. Not that he's a complete monster--he won't kill children or women--but he's not particularly interested in the why or who of his contractors or victims. But then the technically satisfying murder (by remote control fritzing of his pacemaker in a subway car) of a ruling party bureaucrat begins to undo Rain's cool. First, the still-warm corpse of the bureaucrat gets frisked by a Westerner who pops up in the crowded subway car, and then it seems that Rain himself may be the object of a search. Working with his techie pal Harry, Rain follows threads leading to beautiful pianist Midori Kawamura, daughter of the guy he just killed. Sucked in both by her looks and her Julliard-honed jazz skills, Rain befriends Midori, who has no idea he did in Dad but who begins to wonder just what he's about when he bursts into her building to rescue her from intruders when he should have been on his way home. The intruders, the Westerner on the subway, and many others are all after a disk full of political corruption revelations that Midori's father was about to pass to the press just before Rain pulled the switch on his ticker. Rain's black belt comes in exceedingly handy many times before the disk slots into the proper drive. Pleasantly fast and polished, in the John Sandford style. More Rain predicted. Copyright ©Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
