Publisher's Synopsis
Kenzo Kitakata, the undisputed don of Japanese hard-boiled, mystery writing, has never had any of his more than one hundred novels go out of print. Ashes, considered by many to be his masterpiece (adapted for the film Like a Rolling Stone) does for the Japanese Yakuza what The Sopranos does for the American Mafia. Tanaka was once heir to his gang's boss, but has fallen out of favour. Opinionated, irritable, shrewd and lonely, but unconcerned with the typical trophies of the Yakuza way, Tanaka is a convincing portrait of a middle-age man in unusual circumstances.
