Laura Joh Rowland is an American detective/mystery author best known for her series of

historical mystery The historical mystery or historical whodunit is a subgenre of two literary genres, historical fiction and mystery fiction. These works are set in a time period considered historical from the author's perspective, and the central plot involves th ...

novels featuring protagonist set in

feudal Feudalism, also known as the feudal system, was the combination of the legal, economic, military, cultural and political customs that flourished in Middle Ages, medieval Europe between the 9th and 15th centuries. Broadly defined, it was a wa ...

Japan, mostly in Edo during the late 17th century. She is also the author of two other historical mystery series, one featuring a fictionalized

Charlotte Brontë Charlotte Brontë (, commonly ; 21 April 1816 – 31 March 1855) was an English novelist and poet, the eldest of the three Brontë sisters who survived into adulthood and whose novels became classics of English literature. She enlisted i ...

, as well an ongoing series set in

Victorian England In the history of the United Kingdom and the British Empire, the Victorian era was the period of Queen Victoria's reign, from 20 June 1837 until her death on 22 January 1901. The era followed the Georgian period and preceded the Edwardia ...

around the time of the Jack the Ripper murders. Rowland is the daughter of

Chinese American Chinese Americans are Americans of Han Chinese ancestry. Chinese Americans constitute a subgroup of East Asian Americans which also constitute a subgroup of Asian Americans. Many Chinese Americans along with their ancestors trace lineage from ...

and

Korean American Korean Americans are Americans of Korean ancestry (mostly from South Korea). In 2015, the Korean-American community constituted about 0.56% of the United States population, or about 1.82 million people, and was the fifth-largest Asian American ...

immigrants. She grew up in

Michigan Michigan () is a state in the Great Lakes region of the upper Midwestern United States. With a population of nearly 10.12 million and an area of nearly , Michigan is the 10th-largest state by population, the 11th-largest by area, and the ...

and was educated at the

University of Michigan , mottoeng = "Arts, Knowledge, Truth" , former_names = Catholepistemiad, or University of Michigania (1817–1821) , budget = $10.3 billion (2021) , endowment = $17 billion (2021)As o ...

, where she graduated with a B.S. in

Microbiology Microbiology () is the scientific study of microorganisms, those being unicellular (single cell), multicellular (cell colony), or acellular (lacking cells). Microbiology encompasses numerous sub-disciplines including virology, bacteriology, prot ...

and a Masters in

Public health Public health is "the science and art of preventing disease, prolonging life and promoting health through the organized efforts and informed choices of society, organizations, public and private, communities and individuals". Analyzing the det ...

. She lived in

New Orleans New Orleans ( , ,New Orleans
Merriam-Webster. ; french: La Nouvelle-Orléans , es, Nuev ...

Louisiana Louisiana , group=pronunciation (French: ''La Louisiane'') is a state in the Deep South and South Central regions of the United States. It is the 20th-smallest by area and the 25th most populous of the 50 U.S. states. Louisiana is borde ...

until

Hurricane Katrina Hurricane Katrina was a destructive Category 5 Atlantic hurricane that caused over 1,800 fatalities and $125 billion in damage in late August 2005, especially in the city of New Orleans and the surrounding areas. It was at the time the cost ...

nearly destroyed her house, but now lives in

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

.Sleeve note bio on audiobook of ''The Incense Game'', Dreamscape Media, 2012

Sano Ichirō

The novels deal with the experiences of Sano Ichirō, a

samurai were the hereditary military nobility and officer caste of medieval and early-modern Japan from the late 12th century until their abolition in 1876. They were the well-paid retainers of the '' daimyo'' (the great feudal landholders). They h ...

and minor official who, by the end of the first novel, became the trusted chief investigator for the fifth Tokugawa ''

shōgun , officially , was the title of the military dictators of Japan during most of the period spanning from 1185 to 1868. Nominally appointed by the Emperor, shoguns were usually the de facto rulers of the country, though during part of the Kamakur ...

'',

Tokugawa Tsunayoshi was the fifth ''shōgun'' of the Tokugawa dynasty of Japan. He was the younger brother of Tokugawa Ietsuna, as well as the son of Tokugawa Iemitsu, the grandson of Tokugawa Hidetada, and the great-grandson of Tokugawa Ieyasu.Nussbaum, Louis-Fr ...

, and by the tenth novel, was promoted to a very high office. Throughout the stories, Sano constantly had to deal with his problems following the code of

bushido is a moral code concerning samurai attitudes, behavior and lifestyle. There are multiple bushido types which evolved significantly through history. Contemporary forms of bushido are still used in the social and economic organization of Japan. ...

while serving both justice and his master, the Shogun; and with his wife, , who frequently involves herself in Sano's investigations. Sano experiences great pressure as he is faced with death if he does not fulfill his obligations to the ''shōgun'' as well. Rowland takes some

literary license Artistic license (alongside more contextually-specific derivative terms such as poetic license, historical license, dramatic license, and narrative license) refers to deviation from fact or form for artistic purposes. It can include the alterat ...

with known figures, creating fictionalized versions of Tokugawa Tsunayoshi,

Emperor Higashiyama was the 113th emperor of Japan, according to the traditional order of succession.Imperial Household Agency (''Kunaichō'') 東山天皇 (113)/ref> Higashiyama's reign spanned the years from 1687 through to his abdication in 1709 corresponding to ...

in ''The Samurai's Wife'', and

Yanagisawa Yoshiyasu was a Japanese samurai of the Edo period. He was an official in the Tokugawa shogunate and a favourite of the fifth shōgun, Tokugawa Tsunayoshi. His second concubine was Ogimachi Machiko, a writer and scholar from the noble court who wrote ...

. Objective historical details, however, are credibly accurate.

List of Sano Ichirō novels

# ''

Shinjū ''Shinjū'' (心中, the characters for "mind" and "centre") means "double suicide" in Japanese, as in '' Shinjū Ten no Amijima'' (''The Love Suicides at Amijima''), written by the seventeenth-century tragedian Chikamatsu Monzaemon for the ''bun ...

'' (, 1994, Random House) # ''Bundori'' (, 1996, HarperTorch) # '' The Way of the Traitor'' (,1997, Headline Feature) # '' The Concubine's Tattoo'' (, December 1998, St. Martin's Press) # '' The Samurai's Wife'' (, May 2000, St. Martin's Press) # '' Black Lotus'' (, April 2001, St. Martin's Press) # '' The Pillow Book of Lady Wisteria'' (, April 2002, St. Martin's Press) # '' The Dragon King's Palace'' (, April 2003, St. Martin's Press) # '' The Perfumed Sleeve'' (, April 2004, St. Martin's Minotaur) # '' The Assassin's Touch'' (, August 2005, St. Martin's Press) # '' The Red Chrysanthemum'' (, November 2006, St. Martin's Press) # '' The Snow Empress'' (, October 30, 2007, St. Martin's Minotaur) # '' The Fire Kimono'' (, November 11, 2008, St. Martin's Minotaur) # '' The Cloud Pavilion'' (, October 27, 2009, Minotaur Books) # '' The Ronin's Mistress'' (, September 13, 2011, Minotaur Books) # '' The Incense Game'' (, September 18, 2012, Minotaur Books) # '' The Shogun's Daughter'' (, September 17, 2013, St. Martin's Press) # '' The Iris Fan'' (, December 9, 2014, St. Martin's Press)

Annotations

* It is not known if it is intentional that the protagonist's name ''Sano Ichirō'' could be interpreted as a homage to one of Japan's most famous deductive fiction writers, , born in 1928, who uses the

pen-name A pen name, also called a ''nom de plume'' or a literary double, is a pseudonym (or, in some cases, a variant form of a real name) adopted by an author and printed on the title page or by-line of their works in place of their real name. A pen na ...

of ''Sano Yo'' ( 佐野洋). * The title of the first novel is the Romanized form of the term written in

kanji are the logographic Chinese characters taken from the Chinese family of scripts, Chinese script and used in the writing of Japanese language, Japanese. They were made a major part of the Japanese writing system during the time of Old Japanese ...

as 心中, pronounced as

, which refers to a suicide pact by a pair of lovers. * The title of the second novel is the Romanized form of the term written in

katakana is a Japanese syllabary, one component of the Japanese writing system along with hiragana, kanji and in some cases the Latin script (known as rōmaji). The word ''katakana'' means "fragmentary kana", as the katakana characters are derived fr ...

as ブンドリ (''bu-n-do-ri''), which means "seizing the soil of the vanquished", or simply spoils of war or

war trophy __NOTOC__ A war trophy is an item taken during warfare by an invading force. Common war trophies include flags, weapons, vehicles, and art. History In ancient Greece and ancient Rome, military victories were commemorated with a display of captu ...

Other novels

Charlotte Brontë Charlotte Brontë (, commonly ; 21 April 1816 – 31 March 1855) was an English novelist and poet, the eldest of the three Brontë sisters who survived into adulthood and whose novels became classics of English literature. She enlisted i ...
mysteries

# ''The Secret Adventures of Charlotte Brontë''. Overlook Press; 2008. # ''Bedlam: The Further Secret Adventures of Charlotte Brontë''. Overlook Press; 2010.

A Victorian Mystery

# ''The Ripper's Shadow: A Victorian Mystery''. Crooked Lane Books; 2017. # ''A Mortal Likeness: A Victorian Mystery''. Crooked Lane Books; 2018. # ''The Hangman's Secret: A Victorian Mystery''. Crooked Lane Books; 2019. # ''The Woman in the Veil: A Victorian Mystery''. Crooked Lane Books; 2020. # ''Portrait of Peril: A Victorian Mystery''. Crooked Lane Books; 2021. # ''Garden of Sin: A Victorian Mystery''. Crooked Lane Books; 2022.

References

External links

Laura Joh Rowland's Official Web Site

{{DEFAULTSORT:Rowland, Laura Joh American mystery writers American historical novelists Writers of historical mysteries Living people University of Michigan College of Literature, Science, and the Arts alumni American writers of Chinese descent American writers of Korean descent American women novelists 20th-century American novelists 21st-century American novelists 20th-century American women writers 21st-century American women writers Novelists from Michigan Women mystery writers Women historical novelists American women writers of Chinese descent Year of birth missing (living people) University of Michigan School of Public Health alumni Writers of historical fiction set in the early modern period