Totetsu Mo Nai Nippon (Extraordinary Japan)
By Taro Aso Shincho Shinsho, June 2007, 190 pages. Price: ¥ 680. ISBN-13: 978 – 4106102172 Review by Fumiko Halloran
The Meiji Constitution: The Japanese Experience of the West and the Shaping of the Modern State
By Takii Kazuhiro, translated by David Noble I-House Press, Tokyo, 2007, 196 pages (including index), hardcover £140.00, ISBN-13: 978-1435710009 Review by Sir Hugh Cortazzi
Kurosawa Akira vs. Hollywood
By Hiroshi Tasogawa Bungei Shunju, 2006, 486 pages, hardback ￥ 2476, ISBN-13: 978-4163677903 Review by Fumiko Halloran
The Diary of Charles Holme’s 1889 Visit to Japan and North America
The Diary of Charles Holme’s 1889 Visit to Japan and North America with Mrs Lasenby Liberty’s Japan: A Pictorial Record Edited by Toni Huberman, Sonia Ashmore, Yasuko Suga Global Oriental, 2008, 240 pages (including 8 plates and 50 photographs by Lasenby Liberty), hardback £65.00, ISBN-13: 978-1905246397 Review by Dr Jill Raggett
What I Talk About When I Talk About Running
By Haruki Murakami This book is a fascinating account of Murakami’s road to becoming a writer, tied up with his reasons for taking up running. In 1979, Murakami, young and out of University after having studied Greek drama, was at a baseball game. Review by Mikihiro Maeda
John Milne: the man who mapped the shaking earth
By Paul Kabrna Craven and Pendle Geological Society, 2007, 120 pages, paperback £6.50, (Special offer price to Japan Society members, just £5.00 including p & p. E-mail paul_kabrna@msn.com), ISBN 978-0-9555289-0-3 Review by Paul Wignall
Nihon no Ichiban Nagai Natsu (Japan’s Longest Summer)
Edited by Kazutoshi Hando Bunshun Shinsho, Bungei Shunju, October 2007, 181 pages, paperback ￥70, ISBN-13: 978-4166605941 Review by Fumiko Halloran
Hiroshige. One Hundred Famous Views of Edo
By Melanie Trede and Lorenz Bichler Taschen, 2008, 294 pages, Japanese binding & bookcase £80.00, ISBN: 978-3-8228-4827-2 Review by Sir Hugh Cortazzi
Dogs and Demons: The Fall of Modern Japan
Edited by Alex Kerr Penguin Books, 2001, 432 pages, ISBN: 0141010002 Review by Hiroko Kawai (GLOCOM)
Chronicles of My Life, An American in the Heart of Japan
By Donald Keene Columbia University Press,New York, 2008, 208 pages, including photographs and list of names of Japanese mentioned in the text. Hardback £16.50. ISBN 13: 978-0231144407 Review by Sir Hugh Cortazzi