Kabuki is not for everyone. It’s a dark, vaguely SFnal epic about, well, sort of about the intricate connections between crime, empire, sexuality, and power in an imagined Japan which, unlike many inmagined futures, is definitely, clearly, and intelligently linked to real history.
It’s dark.
Dark, dark, dark.
But it is, nonetheless, a gripping tale, the kind of thing that kept me up reading at night, even though I knew the next morning would be an early one. And you know, vengeful women running around with swords and other bladed weapons is — as Quentin Tarantino will never let us forget — big entertainment. Though I’m not sure when I’ll get around to it, I would like to work my way through some of the rest of the installments in the Kabuki series, even if it isn’t for a while.
Here’s a link to the David Mack Guide, which is one of the better current sites on the subject of his work. On the site, you can see preview pages for each book in the series: start with Book 1.