Speed Tribes : Days and Night's with Japan's Next Generation

Rating:
Summary: Just don't forget it's fiction...
Review: This book is enjoyable to read. It presents a side of Japan that is almost unheard of, the disenfranchised. Told as a series of first-person vignettes, with each person similar but distinct. This is the raw underbelly of Japan, violent, disatisfied with life, desperately seeking for an unknown goal. A quick look at the domestic Japanese news reveals that there is a serious crisis of identity occuring, and this is one of the few books that reveals the true roots of the problem. In my time in Japan, I have known people like the characters in this book, and in general the stories ring true. The only thing which prevents me from giving this book 5 stars is that the few places that the Japanese language is used in this book, it is odd or even incorrect. Still, the stories seem to provide an accurate insight into the thinking and lifestyles of many young Japanese.

Rating:
Summary: Insightful
Review: Well, the Library of Congress classified this book as Subculture - Japan - Case Studies, and having read it, I am relatively sure that it is a work of nonfiction. One reviewer claimed that parents would *never* tout the merits of their child at an omiai, yet in "Pink Samurai: Love, Marriage and Sex in Contemporary Japan" Nicholas Bornhoff writes extensively on just this topic. According to Bornhoff, virtually all that happens at an omiai is that parents go on and on about their children's accomplishments ad nauseum. The "date" (which is meant to culminate in arranged marriage) is more like a particularly boring, traditional job interview in which the resume is the main topic under discussion. No wonder "Keiko Nakagami" (perhaps a pseudonym, but nevertheless most likely a living person whom Greenfeld *interviewed*) kept thinking about the Australian she met at a club the other night! Anyway, for those who still have doubts about the book's authenticity, reread the chapter "Dai: The Motorcycle Thief" which is full of interview quotations regarding his "observation period" at a juvenile rehabilitation facility. If this is fiction, this is the most realistic fiction I've ever read ...

Rating:
Summary: Insightful
Review: Well, the Library of Congress classified this book as Subculture - Japan - Case Studies, and having read it, I am relatively sure that it is a work of nonfiction. One reviewer claimed that parents would *never* tout the merits of their child at an omiai, yet in "Pink Samurai: Love, Marriage and Sex in Contemporary Japan" Nicholas Bornhoff writes extensively on just this topic. According to Bornhoff, virtually all that happens at an omiai is that parents go on and on about their children's accomplishments ad nauseum. The "date" (which is meant to culminate in arranged marriage) is more like a particularly boring, traditional job interview in which the resume is the main topic under discussion. No wonder "Keiko Nakagami" (perhaps a pseudonym, but nevertheless most likely a living person whom Greenfeld *interviewed*) kept thinking about the Australian she met at a club the other night! Anyway, for those who still have doubts about the book's authenticity, reread the chapter "Dai: The Motorcycle Thief" which is full of interview quotations regarding his "observation period" at a juvenile rehabilitation facility. If this is fiction, this is the most realistic fiction I've ever read ...