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Hokkaido, Northern Japan, October 1699. A woman is running through the forest. Suddenly, an arrow flies through the air and kills her. In Edo (Tokyo) Chamberlain Sano Ichiro and his wife, Lady Reiko, are enjoying the moon festival at the Zojo Temple. When it is time to go, they find that their eight-year-old son, Masahiro, is missing. Two months later, Masahiro is still missing. Reiko is desolate. She has searched for him everywhere. She is neither eating nor sleeping. She is sure he is still alive. The military dictator of Japan, Tokugawa Tsunayoshi, calls Ichiro to his chamber. The Shogun orders Sano to Hokkaido to find out why the Matsumae clan leader has not come to Edo with the annual tribute. Lord Matsudaira, Sano's enemy, Tokugawa's cousin, whispers to Ichiro that Masahiro is in Hokkaido. Matsudaira knows because his men had kidnapped the boy. Reiko comes with Sano to the far north of Japan. Neither they nor Ichiro's men know what to expect in the way of weather. And when they arrive, they find Matsuma possessed by the ghost of his dead lover, a native woman often called THE SNOW EMPRESS. The indigenous people, the Ainu, look very different from the Japanese and their language is also different. They are forbidden to learn Japanese, for fear that they will begin to trade directly with the emperor. While Sano and his men try to find the murderer of Matsuma's lover, Reiko makes friends with one of the Ainu concubines and searches for Masahiro. Rowland describes the cold and wild north fluently. The Ainu use sealskin for waterproof clothing and drive dogsleds. They also use poisonous arrows set on trip wires for hunting. This is the 12th book in the series set in medieval Japan. Each one seems to be better than the last one. This also has one of the most beautiful dust jackets I have ever seen.
Reviewed by Barbara Franchi, November 2007
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