Lady Joker reads like Don DeLillo’s Underworld rewritten by James Ellroy, or perhaps LA Confidential rewritten by Don DeLillo? What I’m trying to say here is, Lady Joker is EPIC.” An immense and extraordinary feat of writing and translation that has been long-awaited in English, Lady Joker is at once a thriller and a sweeping cultural history of Japan, a love story and a work of poignant social commentary.” Oof. It's long. We see multiple characters alienated from their lives in different ways, plot to kidnap an executive and extort money from his company, Hinode Beer. Once the kidnap happens, these characters disappear from our view. I heard so much good things about this book and was so excited to be able to final read it, but it just didn't meet my expectations. I probably wouldn't have finished it, if it wasn't an ARC. I found it far too detailed and slow. And to make matters worse that detail did nothing to build a picture of the setting or give me much understanding of Japanese culture. Nor was there atmosphere or tension. It just felt like reams and reams of useless information. It was very long and only started to get going about 90% of the way in, which confused me, as I couldn't see how they could wrap up the story. Some how I missed that this was only volume one of the story! I don't think I'll ever find out how this ends.

Lady Joker: Volume 2 by Kaoru Takamura | Hachette UK Lady Joker: Volume 2 by Kaoru Takamura | Hachette UK

It's the first book I've read in a long time without a single non-cis-male main character. Takamura's female characters are wives, secretaries, nieces, daughters and they have no point of view of their own in her telling of the story. She seems deeply fascinating by a society made by, run by and destroyed by men and men only. A tasty, if not always tasteful, tale of supernatural mayhem that fans of King and Crichton alike will enjoy.Lady Joker’s on the move. They’ve demanded six hundred million in cash’ ‘Lady—what?’ … The assistant inspector repeated the English words. ‘Lady as in first lady. Then joker as in the trump card. Lady Joker. That’s what the crime group is calling themselves.’” Not surprisingly, the mood gets darker, and, for some, their involvement is at great cost. Others emerge unscathed but changed. The ending has its sudden surprises and its inevitability. PDF / EPUB File Name: Lady_Joker_Volume_2_-_Kaoru_Takamura.pdf, Lady_Joker_Volume_2_-_Kaoru_Takamura.epub Like Ellroy’s American Tabloid and Carr’s The Alienist, the book uses crime as a prism to examine dynamic periods of social history . . . Takamura’s blistering indictment of capitalism, corporate corruption and the alienation felt by characters on both sides of the law from institutions they once believed would protect them resonates surprisingly with American culture.” Brokenness is incorrect, nor are they desperate: the fire of hatred has been lite and it desires action—so they kidnapped and extort the CEO of Japan’s biggest beer company, Hindoe.

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Centered around an extortion case involving a beer company, Lady Joker would ordinarily be categorized in the crime or mystery novel genre, yet the book deserves to be called an exemplary literary work that depicts contemporary society . . . A magnum opus . . . It requires extraordinary skill to fully depict the ambivalence of Japanese society, in all its detail. Reading Lady Joker together with James Ellroy’s American Tabloid and the drama behind the Kennedy assassination serves as an intriguing comparison. Viewing a society through the lens of a crime is like examining a disease or a corpse to get at the person: it exposes the foundations of human existence.”

Yet while there are acute observations of Japanese life there is also much that is recognisable about modern capitalism in Lady Joker. There is a lot of focus on the beer company and the trials and tribulations of Hinode will be recognised by many working in industries where one firm has a near monopoly of the market and remains desperate to hang onto its market share. There are multiple risks to the company, including from the kidnappers who threaten to damage their product, the opportunities for corporate exploitation by established and organised crime groups as well as the very real threat of having their finances scrutinised by the authorities. This second half of Lady Joker, by Kaoru Takamura, the Grand Dame of Japanese crime fiction, concludes the breathtaking saga introduced in Volume One. Inspired by the real-life Glico-Morinaga kidnapping, an unsolved case which terrorized Japan for two years, Lady Joker reimagines the circumstances of this watershed episode in modern Japanese history and brings into riveting focus the lives and motivations of the victims, the perpetrators, the heroes and the villains. As the shady networks linking corporations to syndicates are brought to light, the stakes rise, and some of the professionals we have watched try to fight their way through this crisis will lose everything–some even their lives. Will the culprits ever be brought to justice? More importantly–what is justice? Lady Joker, Volume Two by Kaoru Takamura – eBook Details

Lady Joker, Volume Two Download [PDF] [EPUB] Lady Joker, Volume Two Download

This book is also about Japanese corporate culture and how boardroom politeness and ass-kissing and ass-covering inaction result in tragedies such as suicide, murder, and organized crime ties! Sounds like a great book for me and all my people on Goodreads!Admirers of intricate crime fiction, which both engages the intellect and offers insights into the hidden parts of a society, will hope for further translations of this gifted author’s work.” We then encounter the eldderly Monoi and his friends from the racecourse including Yo-Chan - a Zainichi (Korean), Nunokawa who struggles through life with a mentally handicapped teenage daughter, and a police sergeant called Handa. Each feels that they have been left neglected within modern Japanese society. Together they devise a plan to kidnap the president and CEO of Hinode - Kyosuke Shiroyama and then hold the company to ransom. You are either going to love this or hate this book. It is slow (and apparently there are four volumes) and much of this first book is leading up to the events that form the end section of this volume and set up the next. In part, it is a look at the focus on business and how that effects the people who work for the business, in this case beer company and how it impacts various people. Takamura’s eye for detail and storytelling prowess are astonishing . . . It’s possible to read Lady Joker in various ways—as a mystery novel, a police procedural, or a cautionary tale of corporate risk management. I read it as an exploration of the original sin of human existence . . . The depth of empathy readers will feel for this book’s characters directly corresponds with the author’s insight on the intersections of human existence.” Anyone who wants to buy Lady Joker will definitely get their money's worth, it's the perfect book to read and mull over for a long period of time. If there was any book you wanted to completely surround yourself with and dive into, this would be a great selection.