Yakuza Moon: Memoirs Of A Gangster's Daughter

Like the title said I really wanted to like this book and some parts of it were genuinely interesting.I think I bought it thinking it was going to me more focused on the Yakuza, when in reality it's almost solely focused on the authors personal relationships and the abuse she went through from men in her life.That being said its not a bad book at all and I'm sure other will enjoy it more than I did.

C'est parfait. Merci

I read this book as part of a group assignment for my English class. I chose to read this book because it looked like it would be an interesting read, and it was. I had a hard time putting it down once I started. The book is about the life of a Japanese Mobster's daughter and the life she lived in her teens and early adulthood.The author writes it like it was how her life was affected by the choice of lifestyle her father lived. How at the age of 12 she became a dropout and her life of sex, drugs, and abuse begins. It's really sad to see how someone can be dragged into that type of lifestyle and how drugs can consume you and put you at risk of being a victim. She kept getting herself into relationships where she would get beaten up, you would think that she would have learned her lesson early on but I guess she wanted someone to love her or care for her or maybe protect her. In the circle of people she lived in she was not going to find that and she later realizes that.It was an easy read, a bit gruesome with the detail she gave but it was what kept you into the book. I would recommend this book to anyone. If you're looking for something to read that is different then your ordinary happy ending story, then look no further this is your book.

First of all, do not expect a well-written memoir. Even if it had been written well in Japanese (which, I gather it was not, as in the foreword the author apologizes for her poor writing), this would have been lost in translation.Do expect an incredibly compact, realistic and harsh telling of a rough life in a societal group that to my knowledge does not get written about by those intimately acquainted with it (not often, not by women).This was a difficult read, because it did not attempt to gloss over or in any way lighten the events recalled. Eye-opening, jarring, perhaps only those who have endured forms of abuse themselves can appreciate the levels of pain one simple sentence conveys without the pretension of long-winded adjectives.

I expected an inside look at the Yakuza from the viewpoint of someone raised in that culture and in the family of a Yakuza boss, unfortunately this was not the case. This book is to those interested in the Yakuza what "Growing up Gotti" is to those interested in the history and culture of the Mafia in America.That said, it is an accurate depiction of the life of a woman raised in a Yakuza family that falls from riches into poverty, a depiction of the stigma attached to the children of the Yakuza in Japan and the role of females in Japanese society, particularly the poor.If your view of Japanese culture is based on an appreciation of Japanese art, architecture and philosophy then this book will be an eye opener to the reality of the common culture in modern Japan. Reading this book was for me like watching a train wreck in slow motion, it is a diary of habitual poor choices and bad decisions made by a young girl who was never equipped by her upbringing to make good ones.I highly recommend this book to anyone raising a child as a "What not to do" guide, and a look at just how quickly a life can be ruined by lacking the self esteem that only parents can give children.