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Summary
Summary
Saru, a street urchin in sixteenth-century Japan, learns to survive by his wits in a city torn by war.
Author Notes
Erik Haugaard was born in Denmark and has traveled extensively in the United States, Italy, Spain, and Japan. Called a writer gifted in the art of the storyteller" by the BOSTON GLOBE, he is internationally known for his accomplishments as a playwright, poet, and translator. He has won critical acclaim for his books for young readers, including A BOY'S WILL, THE UNTOLD TALE, and CROMWELL'S BOY."
Reviews (5)
School Library Journal Review
Gr 5 Up-- In feudal Japan, orphan Saru lives by his wits in a city still threatened by the conflict of rival warlords. He spends winter nights under a little-used shrine, with only a stray cat for warmth; eventually, he makes a few friends who change his life. Saru is likable, the other characters interesting, and the story often moving--the little cat is an excellent touch--but this book does not deliver. The plot moves slowly, with repetition of philosophical ideas and devices. The promised Samurai of the title shows up two thirds into the story, while other apparently major characters are set up, and then do not play large roles. The viewpoint is that of the adult looking back, and is sometimes overly mature. While Saru's insights into the plight of women in his society are laudable, they are also anachronistic. The preface is slow-moving and remote, and may alienate readers. The setting, however, is beautifully realized. Haugaard subtly conveys the foolishness of the feuding warlords, and how their behavior affects the common people; he is realistic about poverty without dwelling too much on the lurid details. The philosophy of the Samurai is introduced easily, as are the beliefs of Buddhism. The language unselfconsciously evokes the patterns of Japanese speech. Fantasy readers, primed to enjoy other cultures, may like this, as may those who have enjoyed the works of Katherine Paterson set in Japan, and Lensey Namioka's tales. --Annette Curtis Klause, Montgomery County Department of Public Libraries, MD (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Publisher's Weekly Review
Saru (``monkey'') lives by begging in feudal Japan. Orphaned and abandoned, Saru watches the constant battling of the warlords and their hired samurai with disgust. He recalls his adventures as a street urchin--he runs afoul of a band of thieves, then sees them massacred; he spends the winter alone living under the shrine of a minor deity, and makes a true friend in Priest Jogen. It is with Jogen that Saru has his greatest adventure. Despite his prejudice against samurai, the boy concocts a plot to rescue the imprisoned wife of the samurai Murakami. Offering a vivid look at an unusual place and time, Haugaard ( The Samurai's Tale ) has created a character that will linger in the reader's memory. Saru's story is drawn with a verisimilitude that overcomes a potentially alien setting, and makes his reminiscences immediate and sympathetic. Ages 10-14. (Mar.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Horn Book Review
The story of the boy Saru, a homeless, ragged orphan adrift in a poverty-stricken city in sixteenth-century Japan. The second part of the novel is essentially a sequel to 'The Samurai's Tale' (Houghton). Imbued with the author's characteristic passion for history and his moral intensity, the book suggests analogies with our own turbulent times. From HORN BOOK 1991, (c) Copyright 2010. The Horn Book, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Kirkus Review
The author of The Samurai's Tale (1984) returns to Tokugawa-era Japan for this leisurely follow-up. Surviving an encounter with a gang of local robbers plus several other adventures, Saru, a seven-year-old orphan, falls in with a kindly priest who shelters and educates him. Seven years later, Saru and the priest help Murakami the samurai rescue his wife, Aki, from the clutches of an evil overlord; together, the four flee the city, cross the mountains, and settle into a peaceful life by the sea. The cast here is large and varied, but most characters appear only briefly while Haugaard uses Sam's encounters with them as opportunities to deliver pithy ruminations on war, justice, human nature, and the like, illuminating the Japanese character and society only secondarily. Readers of Paterson's novels about historical Japan, or the more lurid work of Namioka, may be disappointed by the slow pace here and the way great events remain distant and vague. Still, as in his other fine books, Haugaard's voice is strong and distinctive as he writes of universal hopes and fears. Copyright ©Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Booklist Review
Gr. 6-9. In in a rousing sequel to The Samurai's Tale [BKL Ap 1 84], Saru, a street urchin, looks back over his life and describes how his fate came to intersect that of a samurai who, to save his wife, must outsmart a mighty warlord. The setting of the story is sixteenth-century Japan, but the style is pure Dickens. Even the chapter headings ("In Which I Tell of My Birth and How I Became an Orphan") recall those picaresque Victorian panoramas, as do the assortment of singular characters parading through Saru's life. All of these people have their effect on the boy. Many of them teach about people's cruelty toward each other, but there are a few who show Saru generosity, and in this way the unhappy boy, who most values cunning, learns the importance of kindness. Never, though, is this message offered sentimentally; Haugaard's focus is on life, both its rawness and its richness. The story's unhewn subject matter contrasts well with the author's preciseness of language and deliberate pacing, mirroring both the rough-and-tumble of feudal Japan and the society's formality. As the samurai says to Saru, "One life contains many lives." Haugaard's story contains many stories, wherein the joys, frustrations, and fears of the human condition swirl. ~--Ilene Cooper
