Sujata Massey's lively bicultural series featuring Rei Shimura, the Tokyo antique dealer who can't seem to keep out of trouble, brings her heroine back to her American roots in this engaging tale of corruption and chicanery in the museum exhibition game. Rei is unexpectedly invited to accompany a treasure trove of antique kimonos to a Washington, D.C., museum and to deliver a couple of lectures on the cultural history of the gorgeous garments. A last-minute decision to substitute a priceless wedding kimono for one that's too fragile to travel sets in motion a chain of events that lands Rei in serious peril.

When Rei's former boyfriend, Scottish attorney Hugh Glendinning, turns up at the Washington museum, she's caught up in a romantic crisis, having just settled into a new relationship with Takeo Kayama, the Japanese playboy she met two books ago (in The Flower Master). But that dilemma is soon eclipsed by the theft of the wedding kimono, which was uninsured, and by the disappearance of Rei's seatmate on the flight from Japan. When the seatmate's dead body and Rei's passport and tickets turn up in a Washington dumpster, Rei is suspected of murder, larceny, and even prostitution. Through all this, Massey does a nice job of imparting a wealth of fascinating information on the kimono tradition.

Rei gets more appealing with every outing, and in this one Massey ratchets up the romantic tension and action--maybe because Rei's in a country that's more obsessed with sex than with tradition. Nicely plotted, well characterized, and carefully crafted, this may be Massey's best yet. --Jane Adams


From Publishers Weekly
In this fast, easy-to-follow story filled with fascinating information on Japanese culture from Edgar-nominee and Agatha Award-winner Massey (The Salaryman's Wife), hot-tempered, hot-blooded, Japanese-American Rei Shimura agrees to courier a priceless collection of Edo-period (1615-1857) kimono from a distinguished Tokyo museum to a temporary exhibition in the equally prestigious Museum of Asian Arts in Washington, D.C. To save money, the California-born Shimura, who lives and sells antiques in Tokyo, joins a tour group of women headed for the shopping malls of greater Washington. In the U.S., the plot thickens when someone steals a bridal kimono, uchikake, and a Japanese tourist turns up murdered. The police initially identify the victim as Shimura, but later suspect the sexy Japanese-American antiques dealer is part of a prostitution ring. Further complications arise with the arrival of Shimura's current Japanese boyfriend and her parents, as well as the re-entry into her life of her American ex-lover. Close attention to background both large (recognizable locations in Washington and northern Virginia) and small (the designer clothes the heroine receives from her mother) helps fix the novel solidly in the real world. But it is the romantic suspense and the multicultural details of customs and attitudes of East and West that will keep most readers turning the pages of this absorbing, sophisticated mystery. Agent, Ellen Geiger. Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information, Inc.


From Booklist
Like Massey's previous books, this one can be praised for its astute character development and fascinating use of Japanese history. Similarities to the earlier novels, however, end there. One of the charms of Massey's heroine, Japanese American antiques dealer Rei Shimura, is her self-deprecating sense of humor, but in this surprisingly dark novel, there is no humor to be found. When Rei agrees to transport some valuable nineteenth-century kimonos from Japan to a museum in Washington, D.C., she hardly expects to be entering a nightmare. But that's what it feels like. After Rei is blamed for the theft of one of the kimonos, a young Japanese girl traveling in Rei's group is killed; when Rei attempts to figure out what's going on, she's met with nothing but hostility from everyone she encounters, from the hotel staff to the museum director. This is a good-enough thriller in the hard-edged mold, but those very edges may prove too sharp for Massey's fans, who have come to expect something much lighter (and funnier) from this series. Jenny McLarin
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved


Book Description

Antiques dealer Rei Shimura has managed to snag one of the most lucrative and prestigious jobs of her career: a renowned museum in Washington, D.C., has invited her to exhibit rar kimonos and give a lecture on them. Accompanied by a gaggle of Japanese office ladies bent on a week of shopping, Rei lands in the capital. But her big break could ultimately break her. Within hours one of the kimonos is stolen, and then Rei's passport is discovered in a shopping mall dumpster -- on the dead body of one of the Japanese tourists. Trouble is only beginning, though, for now Rei's parents have arrived and so has her ex-boyfriend. To track down the kimono and unmask a killer, Rei's got to do some clever juggling, fast talking, and quick sleuthing, or this trip home could be her last.


About the Author
Sujata Massey was born in England to parents from India and Germany.She studied writing at Johns Hopkins University and worked as a reporter for the Baltimore Evening Sun before moving to Japan, whre she taught English and began writing mystery fiction.The Rei Shimura series starts with The Salaryman's Wife, which won the Agatha Award for best first novel of 1997, and continues with Zen Attitude, and Edgar and Anthony nominee, and The Flower Master.At present Sujata Massey lives with her family in Baltimore and travels to Japan to research future Rei Shimura novels.

FROM THE PUBLISHER

Rei Shimura is struggling to build her antiques business in Tokyo when she gets a call from a Washington, D.C. museum, asking her to act as courier to transport a set of priceless early 19th-century kimonos. Thus begins the adventure of a lifetime, involving stolen articfacts, a wacky tour group of Japanese women heading for the U.S., shopping malls, and a very dead body.

Rei manages to reunite with her parents in California to uncover a story of long-dead lovers, to rekindle a tempestuous affair with the man who just might be her Mr. Right, and—of course&3151;to solve the crime.

FROM THE CRITICS

Publishers Weekly

In this fast, easy-to-follow story filled with fascinating information on Japanese culture from Edgar-nominee and Agatha Award-winner Massey (The Salaryman's Wife), hot-tempered, hot-blooded, Japanese-American Rei Shimura agrees to courier a priceless collection of Edo-period (1615-1857) kimono from a distinguished Tokyo museum to a temporary exhibition in the equally prestigious Museum of Asian Arts in Washington, D.C. To save money, the California-born Shimura, who lives and sells antiques in Tokyo, joins a tour group of women headed for the shopping malls of greater Washington. In the U.S., the plot thickens when someone steals a bridal kimono, uchikake, and a Japanese tourist turns up murdered. The police initially identify the victim as Shimura, but later suspect the sexy Japanese-American antiques dealer is part of a prostitution ring. Further complications arise with the arrival of Shimura's current Japanese boyfriend and her parents, as well as the re-entry into her life of her American ex-lover. Close attention to background both large (recognizable locations in Washington and northern Virginia) and small (the designer clothes the heroine receives from her mother) helps fix the novel solidly in the real world. But it is the romantic suspense and the multicultural details of customs and attitudes of East and West that will keep most readers turning the pages of this absorbing, sophisticated mystery. Agent, Ellen Geiger. (Sept. 1) Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information.

VOYA

Needing money, Tokyo antiques dealer Rei Shimura eagerly accepts the offer of a Japanese textile museum to accompany a selection of historic kimonos to a showing in Washington, D.C. When one of the valuable kimonos is stolen right before the show and the body of a young Japanese woman, who was in the same tour group as Rei, turns up in a dumpster, Rei finds herself playing amateur detective. As with the four previous books in this series, Massey gives readers not just an entertaining mystery but also an informative glimpse into some aspect of Japanese culture, this time the fascinating world of kimonos. The author interweaves Rei's search for the missing kimono with Rei's attempts to untangle her complicated romantic life when both her Japanese boyfriend and her Scottish ex-boyfriend show up in Washington. Massey deftly handles Rei's feelings of being torn between these two men, including the guilt Rei experiences when she winds up sleeping with her ex-boyfriend, and in many ways Rei's romantic experiences mirror her feelings of being torn between two different cultures. This novel is an excellent choice for older teens who enjoy amateur sleuth mysteries that include a generous measure of romance. VOYA CODES: 4Q 4P S A/YA (Better than most, marred only by occasional lapses; Broad general YA appeal; Senior High, defined as grades 10 to 12; Adult and Young Adult). 2001, HarperCollins, 310p, $25. Ages 15 to Adult. Reviewer: John Charles SOURCE: VOYA, February 2002 (Vol. 24, No.6)

Kirkus Reviews