The Samurai's Garden by Gail Tsukiyama

Availability

Libraries seem to have copies available, but there are some pretty cheap ones through Amazon if you'd rather go that route. Just a reminder that there are links to the right for the closest library systems and to a few online booksellers.

Any who have read it and want to get the conversation started post your questions and comments below!

From the Author's Website:  

The Samurai's Garden 
"On the eve of the Second World War, a young Chinese man is sent to his family's summer home in Japan to recover from tuberculosis. He will rest, swim in the salubrious sea, and paint in the brilliant shoreside light. It will be quiet and solitary. But he meets four local residents - a lovely young Japanese girl and three older people. What then ensues is a tale that readers will find at once classical yet utterly unique. Young Stephen has his own adventure, but it is the unfolding story of Matsu, Sachi, and Kenzo that seizes your attention and will stay with you forever. Tsukiyama, with lines as clean, simple, telling, and dazzling as the best of Oriental art, has created an exquisite little masterpiece."


Gail Tsukiyama
Gail Tsukiyama was born in San Francisco, California to a Chinese mother from Hong Kong and a Japanese father from Hawaii. She attended San Francisco State University where she received both her Bachelor of Arts Degree and a Master of Arts Degree in English with the emphasis in Creative Writing.  Most of her college work was focused on poetry, and she was the recipient of the Academy of American Poets Award.  A resident of the San Francisco Bay Area, she has been apart-time lecturer in Creative Writing at San Francisco State University, as well as a freelance book reviewer for the San Francisco Chronicle.  

May's Book: Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother by Amy Chua

"This is a story about a mother, two daughters, and two dogs. It’s also about Mozart and Mendelssohn, the piano and the violin, and how we made it to Carnegie Hall.
This was supposed to be a story of how Chinese parents are better at raising kids than Western ones.
But instead, it’s about a bitter clash of cultures, a fleeting taste of glory, and how I was humbled by a thirteen-year-old…"
(From the opening of Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother)

Links:
About Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother
About Amy Chua
Amy Chua about her book
Link to Q&A between Amy Chua and readers of an article about the book  

A Couple Updates:
The Q&A above is a response to an article, Why Chinese Mother's are Superior, which is excerpts from the book, but there is one picture that's not in the book and there are a few pictures from the book but they are in color.
Also very interesting is that in response to that excerpt people went crazy with hate mail and such, but there was also a response from her daughter, Sophia.  Dear Tiger Mom (make sure you read page 2 as well, I almost didn't see it).