Library Journal Review

Starred Review. Inspired by real stories of the Japanese imperial family, Schwartz's (Reservation Road; Bicycle Days) intimate and striking novel fictionalizes the life of Haruko, empress of Japan, who narrates a touching and complicated tale of breaking traditions and facing the reality of living as royalty. Raised in an upper-class family, Haruko attends private school and plays tennis at the nearby country club. In 1959, she is selected as the first nonaristocratic woman to marry into the Japanese monarchy, which she discovers to be an oppressive world of mysterious rules and regulations. The strains caused by constant breaches in protocol and betrayals by the royal family and the staff cause Haruko to suffer a nervous breakdown and lose her voice. But she soon recovers with a new view of her duties and responsibilities. Thirty years later, Haruko is now the empress, and she faces the duty of marrying her son to a young woman who is a rising star in the foreign ministry. While she persuades the modern commoner to accept her son's proposal, Haruko also tries to right the wrongs of her past, with tragic results. With a strong narrative voice and well-researched historical background, this is strongly recommended for all fiction collections. [See Prepub Alert, LJ 10/1/07; this may appeal to fans of Arthur Golden's Memoirs of a Geisha.?Ed.]?Ron Samul, New London, CT Copyright ? Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.