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Summary: Simply Incredible!
Review: This was one (if not the) best book I have ever read. Clavell weaves this masterpiece of adventure, lust, war, and history into a novel that keeps the reader in a state of utter suspence for all 1152 pages. On every page of the work, the story thickens and a new twist in the plot is revealed.
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Summary: Scott Porter
Review: I read Shogun five years ago and I am currently reading it a second time. It is a wonderful, exciding and very readable book. I would give the book 5 stars if I was not frusterated with Clavell's manipulation of History. Knowing a bit about Japanese feudal history makes it difficult to adjust to the fictitious names, events, and cultural practices.Aside from that minor complaint, I would recommend Shogun to just about anyone. I don't doubt that I will be reading it a third time in a few more years. If you enjoy Shogun, you should try Taiko by Yoshikawa. I would rate Taiko a 6 stars if possible.
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Summary: Best Book I've ever Read!
Review: This book is the best i have EVER read, There is everything possible you could want in here, A good plot most importantly! I'm in my early teens and the is the best book i think i will ever read! The fact that it's set back in medevil japan makes the author have to do alot of research and even the use of japanese words must have been a challange! I lerned so much about medeviel japan from this book! I am personally a huge fan of everything japanese, especially Anime(japanese Animation). I belive anyone who reads this will love it and want everyone they know to read it!
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Summary: One of the Finest "Popular" Historical Novels!
Review: For sheer narrative power and immersion in another world, few have done it better than Clavell in Shogun. The book grabs you from the first page and never seems to let go. It's an easy read, too, since you barely notice you're reading. (I read it in three days back in the seventies, hardly stopping for air, and have needed bifocals with reading lenses ever since.) A tale of a shipwrecked English ship's pilot in 16th century Japan, this book sweeps the reader through a murky world of political intrigue and bloody violence as the English protagonist, Blackthorne, encounters an alien culture and a world quite unlike any he had known before. Yet, for all its rich evocation of the medieval Japanese nation, the book has some unfortunate blunders including an allusion to a samurai using judo (not invented until the 1880's, while this book takes place in the 16th century) and another shaking off his sandals to kick at an enemy (quite out of character for such warriors since they were predominantly weaponed soldiers who would never choose to kick an enemy if they had access to one of their traditional instruments of war as this one manifestly does . . . and besides so-called karate kicking wasn't introduced into Japan, from Okinawa, until the 1920's). The worst error, however, had Lord Toranaga, Blackthorne's captor and mentor, playing chess, a western game, when it would have made more sense for him to be playing the indigenous Japanese game of go instead. But the Japanese warriors did have jiu-jitsu, the forerunner of modern judo, and kicking could have been a part of what they did (however unlikely) and Toronaga could have taught himself chess since he is portrayed as a quick study with a keen and very deep mind. And besides, these are minor quibbles. Basically, this is a powerful tale of intrigue and maneuvering as the players move about on the chessboard of feudal Japan, never certain who among them is really moving the pieces and who is just being moved -- at least until the end. The sense and feel of the culture, if not the details, also ring remarkably true and you do feel as though you've lived the entire experience when at last you close the book on the final page. The characters themselves are based on real people; the events on things that really occurred -- though Clavell granted himself literary license to manipulate and recast what he found in the histories to make his tale a more dramatic one. It's not a true story in that sense, but it's a great one and well worth a pair of glasses.
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Summary: Caution on the hardback version
Review: Fantastic book, my paperback edition finally wore out so I got the hardback this time. Mistake! It is an "Econo clad book" which means it is the paperback with a VERY cheap hardcover. Ripoff!
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Summary: cmemphom
Review: While visiting my parents over the Christmas Holiday I picked up their paperback version of Shogun. Having lived in Japan for close to five years as a middle school student in the late '70's and early 80's I was spellbound by Clavell's ability to portray Japanese culture. Although the story takes place in the early 1600's the reader, if they so choose, can relate to modern day Japanese culture. i.e. their work habits, their dedication to their jobs and those above them (bosses and managers), their organization and their ability to keenly focus. One phrase from the book that sums up this "Japanese attitude" is "it's stupid to fail." A well written book based on an actual historical events leading to the rise of the Tokugawa regime.
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Summary: an epic tale....
Review: ....of love and intrigue in ancient Japan. Well-drawn characters and a complex plot.
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Summary: Underrated masterpiece of historical fiction
Review: Many readers of what some consider to be classic (using that term in its modern definition - not in its "Greek & Roman" Renaisance definition) novels or literary novels are disdainful of any work that reaches heights of popularity with the book-buying masses. While I certainly agree that popularity is NO warrant for literary achievement - it certainly is not a strike against it either. Defoe, Dickens, Cooper, Hawthorne, Thackery and Scott were all wildly popular in their day and they all produced "literature" of an exceptionally high order. I have read them - as well as all of Clavell with the exception - so far - of "Noble House", and I feel confident that he wrote at a level that is well above standard modern fiction. Shogun is one of the most interesting, intriguing, thought-provoking and fascinating historical romances I have ever read. I enjoyed every moment of it and was unable to go to bed while I was reading it since I always wanted to finish the chapter I was on - then the next chapter - then the next - etc. Clavell ranks, in my view, as an author with Stephen King as an author of fiction (regardless of the moral worth of it) that is considered mass-marketed but is actually so well-crafted, so patiently wrought, that it takes over the reader and transports them into the author's world. That, after all, is the real test of fiction isn't it?
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Summary: Shogun
Review: I must admit that the bulkiness of the novel was a bit intimidating when I first picked it up 10 years ago. When I finished it I was longing for more and since then I have reread it about 4 times. This book is excellent. If there is anything to add to the certainties in life that I will die and I will continue to pay taxes, it will be that I will read Shogun again, and again, and again. Clavell weaves a harmonious web of honor, duty, loyalty, devotion, and romance that leaves the reader in nirvana when the last page is finally turned. To go through life without reading this novel...Kinjiru!
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Summary: Very detailed, very involved.. a great read
Review: I first read this book in the summer of 1975, and it was the first Clavell book I had ever touched. I have bought several others on the strength of my appreciation for Shogun alone, though they have almost all earned similar kudos. The story is incredibly detailed; the threads and points of view disparate but handled with fantastic finesse and attention to interlocking them into each other; and the ending a surprise (to me at least), but with a feeling of massive inexorability about it that provides fulfillment and complete closure. If you're looking for good, absorbing, exciting, and entertaining literature with which you can settle down for several hours, and are willing to have your eyes opened by one of the best introductions I've ever encountered to a truly non-Western culture, please give this book a try.
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