December 6: A Novel [ペーパーバック]

Give Smith credit for creativity: this is certainly an unusual, if not bizarre, subject for a story. Harry Niles is a mysterious main character. Accepted fully by neither western nor eastern cultures, perpetually only a step ahead of (or behind) the law, the reader never knows exactly where to categorize Niles: hero, spy, traitor, patriot?. Supporting characters are likewise complex and unable to be easily quantified. Michiko, Harrys mistress: the cool and aloof juke-box jockey, yet also the submissive geisha. Ishigami, the sword-yielding samurai demon with a uniquely Japanese penchant for both honor and terror. Smith adroitly blends Japanese tradition in the background, avoiding the tendancy of many western authors writing of Japan to allow the culture to overshadow the story. The imminent war is portrayed from a uniquely Japanese, and fatalistic, perspective. Like all of Smiths novels, the characters and events are intricately woven in a complex fabric of intrigue and suspense, leading to a surreal, nearly mystical, climax.

What December 6 lacks in sheer thrills and fast action of Gorky Park is compensated by the intelligent and convoluted story line and though-provoking characters. As with all of Smiths novels, December 6 leaves the reader anxiously awaiting his next effort.

Harry Niles grew up in Japan, the son of American Baptist missionaries, zealous in their determination to bring the light of God to the Japanese. Harry's Uncle Orin, a devout alcoholic, baby-sat him as his parents wandered the country spreading the Word, with no knowledge of the Japanese language, or culture, and no desire to learn. The couple saw Harry as a "sort of amphibian, neither honest, nor stupid, neither adult nor innocent, neither American nor Japanese." And Harry, who ran wild in the streets of Tokyo, at home in the shady underworld, dance halls, and back-room card games, learned early to survive well in this environment - and became a master of the "artful scam." He survived Japanese school, where he was the only "gaijin," (foreigner), forever playing the Indian to the Japanese schoolboys' cowboy...or samurai, as it were. He also learned the aesthetics of Shinto, which he was more comfortable with than his parent's Christianity; as well as Japanese ethics, their world view in general, their take on international politics, etc..

The narrative switches back and forth between Harry's adolescence, and his present life, in early December, 1941. He owns the "Happy Paris," an American jazz bar, where a juke box provides the music, and his Japanese Communist lover, Michiko, selects the tunes. He is a con man with a heart of gold. Niles has more than an inkling that the Japanese are about to attack Hawaii - he is a man with many sources, and knows how to do simple addition. And 2+2 = Pearl Harbor. He needs to be on the last flight out of the country - otherwise the consequences won't be pretty. Japanese military and intelligence officials don't particularly care for him, and neither do the Americans, nor the Brits, for that matter. His last days in Japan, before the war, are filled with intrigue, suspense and murder.

Cruz Smith writes a tight, taut narrative, as always. He is a master at building suspense, in a real life drama that is already fraught with tension. His research is impeccable and I learned much while enjoying the read. Descriptions of a meeting of the elite Chrysanthemum Club, where Harry tells the Japanese version of the upcoming hostilities, are both hilarious and informative; as is the scene where Harry plays catch with the Japanese Giants' baseball team. One minute you're laughing, the next you're biting your nails.

Harry Niles is Smith's real masterpiece, however. Niles breathes life into every event and person that surround him. He is a perfect anti-hero on the surface. He is well aware of the multitude of contradictions that make-up his persona, and accepts them, even enjoys them, with a dark, sardonic humor. The scam has a whole new meaning in Harry's hands - his cons can cause war! Yet he is also a decent and kind man. Just beneath the surface, there exists the man who saved many Chinese lives in Japan's brutal rape of Nanking. And he continues to help both friends and strangers up until the novel's last page. Harry just doesn't want anyone to know. He doesn't want to be anyone's hero.

This is one of Martin Cruz Smith's best works. The historical aspect and original point of view make it 5 Stars all the way!

JANA

In fact, this book is as useful in helping to understand Japan in 1941 as it is for trying to understand our current challenge in dealing with the reactionary Wahhabi sect of Islam, the system of terror based on religious belief, and the isolation of Hezballah, Hamas, and Al Qaeda from the West. The core principle that language is only the first of many cultural differences is the key to understanding the challenge facing any diplomat or intelligence agent trying to penetrate and predict a truly different society.

Martin Cruz Smith has created an American missionary's son who is as vivid and believable as any of the Russians in his Gorky Park series. Smith suggests that a young man who had grown up inside Japanese culture with Japanese playmates and fluency in the Japanese language would have a completely different understanding of the culture than the American embassy or missionaries who came as outsiders to change it rather than understand it.

Smith creates an almost Humphrey Bogart like character in an almost Casablanca scene but with distinctly Japanese differences. He tells the story of a culture that believes in seppuku (ceremonial suicide), a culture which saw everyone not Japanese as not quite human (and therefore saw the killing of hundreds of thousands of Chinese as an event not worth noticing), and a culture which felt its very life being suffocated by the huge presence of the Americans across the Pacific and their potential ability to strangle Japanese society by cutting off the flow of oil. This is a culture very unlike Vichy, France and even more alien than the Gestapo and the Third Reich.

You will find the personalities, the plot, and the scenes believable, engaging, and intriguing. Once started this is not a book you will want to put down.