Lee Turner killed his roommate. At least he’s pretty sure he did. He’s also pretty positive that his mom was kidnapped by traffickers and forced into a suitcase in Asia. After the supposed murder of his college roommate, Lee flees New York and hides in his father’s home in the countryside of Japan. Once his sedatives wear off, Lee realizes there are some pretty weird things about the house. For one, no animals will come near it. There’s also the fact that his bedroom window isn’t always a window, and a woman with a sword keeps showing up on their lawn. From 2026 we go back in time to 1877. Sen is a young woman who has been trained in secret by her father to be a Samurai, even if the Samurai have fallen. Her brutal father forces Sen to adapt to his regular cruelty to her and her family. When a foreign man appears outside her window, she determines she will figure out what this strange ghost wants. As Lee and Sen find a way to communicate, it becomes clear that some secrets are meant to stay hidden.
I’m going to start out by telling you one of my biggest dislikes is the parallel timeline type of story, so this book was automatically not going to be my favorite. Still, I loved Kylie Lee Baker’s Bat Eater and Other Names for Cora Zheng, so I wasn’t going to miss this. The book starts off strong with the fractured world of Lee Turner before alternating into Sen’s story. Baker is a champion of building on little hurts to get to larger horrific moments that leave the reader stunned. Japanese Gothic is no exception. From a Samurai father who forces Sen to cut rabbits in half (or he will kill them even slower), to Lee’s dark description of what he thought happened to his mother, the book does not shy away from gore or the worst-case scenarios for the people who orbit Lee and Sen. There’s one particular scene involving Sen’s mother during a difficult dinner that still makes me wretch a bit. I wanted to love Japanese Gothic, but my brain kept trying to find logic where none was necessary.
Japanese Gothic is less about a ghost and more about the horrific acts that haunt our human existence.
Japanese Gothic is now available from Hanover Square Press.
