Overview

When Japan transitioned from 264 years of rule under the military-led Tokugawa Shogunate to the restoration of imperial power during the Meiji era, it embarked on a path of rapid modernization. This modernization came at an enormous cost, a cost that was borne primarily by the already repressed members of Japan's society - the impoverished rural women, the female factory laborers, and the sex industry workers. Born during the latter part of the Meiji era, a former geisha and prostitute, Abe Sada was elevated to celebrity status after committing the most heinous crime in 20th century Japan. After being convicted and imprisoned for strangling and emasculating her lover with a kitchen knife, she became the subject of countless articles, books, and movies. Although she remains very famous in Japan, not much is known about her life outside of Japan except for what was depicted in the sexploitation film In the Realm of the Senses. Of the countless works produced about her, very few have dared to faithfully examine her life or to discuss the series of tragic events which pushed her to commit the crime. In Nickname: Flower of Evil, you are invited to travel back to the newly modernized, male-dominated, misogynistic, post-Tokugawa era in Japan, where women were deprived of their economic independence, subjected to the will of the household heads, and sold into the sex industry. This was the world into which Abe Sada was born, raised, and forced to survive.

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9780578551470

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Reviews

Ohkubo's vast knowledge of Japanese culture and history brings light to truth in her book about Japan's infamous murderer, Abe Sada. Displaying her gift with words, the talented author makes us understand that Abe was no cold-blooded killer, but a victim of the cruel patriarchy ruling her country. The candid love scenes, the heightened sexuality Abe experiences as she searches for someone willing to truly love her, and the shameful powerlessness she silently endures as men make decisions about her body and her life, all help to show us a vulnerable character who was severely abused. When Abe was put on trial for murdering her lover and removing his genitalia, all of Japan was riveted on the tale of this woman scorned as a brutal killer. But Ohkubo's exhaustive research results in a very different, more empathetic, narrative; and, we readers are breathlessly captivated by Abe's story from the very first page to the last. -- Yayoi Winfrey Little is known in the UK about Abe Sada and the notorious murder that rocked 1930s Japan. Kristine Ohkubo tells the tale with clarity and insight, in the process exploring the gender inequality that permeated the country after it opened up to the West, and that continues even now. It's a shocking story, of a bright, clever girl psychologically-damaged by her vulnerable position in the male-dominated society, raped as a teenager, sold into prostitution by her own father, manipulated and taken advantage of by men, until her tale reaches its terrible conclusion. Abe Sada has continued to be exploited in pornographic films and novels, presented as a sexually-rapacious female murderer - the truth is different . . . A tragic story about a woman in a world that gave women so very few opportunities . . . Recommended. - Suz Winspear

Author Information

KRISTINE OHKUBO is an avid traveler, blogger, and Japanophile. A graduate of DePaul University, she developed a deep love and appreciation of Japanese culture, people, and history early in life. Her travels in Japan have enabled her to gain insight into this fascinating culture, which she shares with you through her work. Her first book, a travel guide to Japan, was published in 2016. In 2017, she released a historical study of the Pacific War written from the perspective of the Japanese people, both those who were living in Japan and in the United States, when the war broke out. She supplemented her releases in 2019 with a work that examines the influences of Western culture and Freemasonry on the Westernization and subsequent modernization of China and Japan. Kristine's latest book tells the story of an infamous twentieth century geisha who was both a victim and an aggressor, struggling amidst a strict patriarchal culture and a rapidly changing social system. Kristine believes that writing from other cultural perspectives encourages empathy and understanding, and at the same time broadens our knowledge of the events which have unfolded over the years. As an author, she encourages her readers to let their curiosity and hunger for knowledge be boundless, as she invites them to explore her work.

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