James Clavell

A narrative of conflicting cultures, loyalties, motivations, and traditions in early-seventeenth-century Japan, involving the powerful and powerhungry Lord Toranaga, the ambitious Englishman, Blackthorne, and the Lady Mariko, a Catholic convert in love with the barbarian Englishman.

John Blackthorne is a ship-wrecked English navigator who becomes both an observer and a participant in historic changes in Japan during the Tokugawa, or, Edo period. Toranaga is a feuding warlord vying to become the supreme military dictator, or shōgun. Blackthorne is drawn into the turmoil and becomes determined to be the first foreigner to become a samurai warrior.