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BRIDE'S KIMONO
by Sujata Massey
Harper Collins, August 2001
310 pages
$25.00
ISBN: 0060199334


Buy in the UK | Buy in Canada

Rei Shimura is offered a job taking 10 very valuable kimono from a Tokyo museum to one in Washington DC, for a long planned exhibition. Mr. Shima, the Japanese museum employe is, at the last minute, unable to go and despite Rei's mixed ancestry and youth, her expertise in Japanese textiles sways the board. In order to save money. she books herself onto a package tour, planning to stop off in California to visit with her parents, whom she hasn't seen in years, before returning to Tokyo.

A Customs broker shepherds her through to the plane. She has booked 2 seats in business class, one for her boxes and one for herself, but things start going wrong as soon as she takes her seat. The airline has booked someone else into her seat, and since the other person makes more noise, the flight attendants move Rei and her boxes to coach, where she is seated next to Hana, a young "office lady" off to the US on her last fling before entering into an arranged marriage and settling down.

One of the original 10 kimono the Morioka Museum had promised to lend to the Asian Arts Museum is declared to be too fragile to ship, so Rei and Mr. Shima, at the last minute substitute a beautiful wedding kimono, so that the number on loan will remain at 10. But when Rei arrived in Washington, the Edo period bride's kimono is rejected by the department head in charge of the exhibit because, she claims, of lack of insurance. Jet-lagged and dejected, Rei takes the kimono back to her hotel. Since the hotel safe deposit boxes are too small, she locks the kimono in her suitcase in the closet of her room and starts getting ready for bed.

However before Rei can get to sleep, she has two interruptions. Her ex-boyfriend, Scottish lawyer Hugh Glendenning comes to the hotel to discuss their situation and Kyoko, Hana's friend and roommate is concerned because Hana has not returned to their room and persuades Rei to help her search the mall. Both times, on getting back to her room, Rei's key doesn't work and she has to go to the desk to have it reprogrammed. The second time this happens, Rei starts to put her clothes away before going to bed and finds the kimono has been stolen from her suitcase. Her passport and airline tickets are also missing.

When Hana's body is found in a dumpster with Rei's passport, and Rei cannot be found immediately, the police call Rei's parents in California who immediately arrange to come to Washington, and even after Rei tells them she's alive, they continue their trip East to spend some time with their daughter and with Rei's grandmother, who lives in Baltimore.

Rei's character has evolved with every book. In The Salaryman's Wife she was newly arrived in Japan and had to start making a life for herself in a new country. By now, America seems foreign to her, and she has to readjust to the American way of life. Massey has an interesting story about the kimono and about the Japan of almost 200 years ago, as well as pointing out the differences between the two countries today.

Reviewed by Barbara Franchi, December 2001

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Contact: Yvonne Klein (ymk@reviewingtheevidence.com)


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