A Samurai Never Fears Death

 

 A Samurai Never Fears Death

By Dorothy Hoobler and Thomas Hoobler

Taylor Kovacs

Ms. White

Honors World History 

13 October 2014

Characters
Seikei (main character)
Denzaburo (Seikei's brother)
Asako (Seikei's sister)
Judge Ooka (Seikei's adoptive father)

Summary
Seikei was adopted into the samurai family by Judge Ooka as a young boy and became a samurai. At 16 he and some other samurai are asked to go to his hometown because murders have been occurring there. He is excited to see his family again but that excitement quickly turns into a nightmare. He gets caught in a horrible web of murders. His sister, Asako, falls in love with a puppet master who is accused of murder. He discovers that his brother, Denzaburo, is using their fathers tea shop to smuggle goods. He is torn between his old and his new family all while he has to find the real murderer.

Quotes
"Though he did not want to admit it, he was curious about the puppet theater." (19) This is when Seikei was considering going to the puppet theater after Denzaburo invited him.

"From the time he could read, Seikei had studied the code of bushido, instead of learning the skill of the abacus, as his father had wished, but knowing the way of the warrior did not make him a samurai." (4-5) This shows just how much Seikei wanted to become a samurai before he was adopted.

"He wondered if he should stop and confront Denzaburo, but there was more that Seikei needed to find out before he did that." (83) This is when Seikei started to suspect Denzaburo was smuggling goods.

Author & Sources
Dorothy and Thomas Hoobler were married in 1971. Dorothy was born in Philadelphia in 1941 and Thomas was born in Cincinnati. By 2006 Dorothy and Tom published about 90 books under their own names. They did a fantastic job writing this book. It is very rare to find a book where the author is more than one person but this couple pulled it off perfectly.

Critique
Samurai were extremely important in Japan in history. They were basically the military of Japan. They were very honorable and did what they had to do as a samurai. The book itself was more interesting than I thought it would be. Again, the authors of this book could not have done better with writing such an amazing novel. This mystery keeps you guessing who the real murderer is, it definitely keep you on the edge of your seat. I recommend that people who enjoy a good mystery should read this book.