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"TOKYO COWBOY"
(a mainstream novel)
by Jorian Clair
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The 50th anniversary year of Pearl Harbor (1991) is not a good time for a Japanese businessman to be going “deep into the Heart of Texas.” But Hiroshi Nakamura, who also is a Zen Buddhist and a karate master, has no choice. Survival of his family’s honor and Tokyo business depend on his changing the mind of the owner of a cattle ranch who has backed out of a telephone agreement to sell the Lazy T to Nakamura Meat Company.
When Hiroshi and his associate arrive at their destination, their presence detonates an explosion of incidents that culminate in dynamic action and character transformations. Those most affected include: the volatile, strong-willed widow who is fighting to keep her fourth-generation ranch, ensure the future of her precocious 10-year-old daughter, and resolve the conflicting emotions she feels for Nakamura and the taciturn Lazy T foreman she has silently loved since childhood; the banker who must have the ranch to complete a major land swindle; the con artist fronting for him who has an obsessive hatred for the Japanese race; and locals fearful that a World War II enemy is planning to take over Texas land. Cultural collisions ignite humorous episodes and racial confrontations, and launch journeys of self-discovery that lead to unexpected resolutions.
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Author's Notes:
I believe that to entertain, a novel must be a page-turning “good read,” one with an intricately plotted story, multi-dimensional characters and the kind of narrative pacing that keeps pulling me from chapter to chapter because I must find out what is going to happen next.
Educate is the word I use for a learning experience. No matter what the subject, I find it richly rewarding to learn something new when I read a novel. Enlighten is a word that represents what happens at the sub-text or “deeper” level of a novel, such as character transformations that result in a deeper understanding of self. Nothing is more personally enriching to me than to realize that the reading of a particular novel has expanded the canvas of my Mental, emotional and/or spiritual insights and perceptions.
Addendum: Regarding writing style, I chose to right the Prologue and Epilogue in the present tense, while the rest of the novel is written in the past tense and the story is presented in a linear fashion because that is the type of storytelling I prefer to read.
In the opening scene of the Prologue, I chose a “thick minimalist” style to help the reader get inside the meditative mind of the protagonist where his greatest internal conflicts are revealed.
Although the prologue and first four chapters of the novel take place in Japan and we return there for the Epilogue, the balance of the story takes place in Texas where I was born and raced quarter horses in small town rodeos at age 11. (Yes, I have followed the maxim of writing about what I know.)
Jorian Clair
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