By Samantha Picaro
This horror novel takes place in an isolated house in Japan, where two people from different time periods meet and endure horrors born of both their environment and their own minds. Lee is an American living in the present who has killed his roommate without remembering or understanding why, so he flees to Japan to stay with his father. There, he meets Sen through a mysterious door—a female samurai from 1877 whose father still clings to the abolished samurai system and whose family is constantly in danger of being discovered by imperial soldiers hunting down rogue samurai. Each initially believes the other is a ghost, and they distrust one another until they reluctantly join forces to uncover what is happening within this strange house.
The horror comes not only from terrifying visions of bloodstains and corpses, but also from the psychological terror the characters endure. Lee struggles to remember how and why he killed his college roommate, while Sen remains devoted to her father despite his physical and verbal abuse and the constant fear that her family will be discovered. The descriptions of the settings, characters, and supernatural elements are vivid, eerie, and immersive, making readers feel as though they are experiencing the horrors alongside the characters. Ultimately, the true horror of the story lies in the cruelty many of the characters inflict upon one another.
The novel explores many themes, including isolation. Not only are Lee and Sen separated from the rest of the world while at the house, but they also feel disconnected from other people, including their own families, as perpetual outsiders. The inability to move forward is another central theme: Lee and his father are trapped in the past because of his mother's disappearance, while Sen's father clings to the samurai way of life despite the class having been dismantled. Readers unfamiliar with Japanese history will gain insight into the history of the samurai, their values, and how those ideals shape Sen's determination to protect her family and earn her father's approval. The story begins, unfolds, and ends with Lee and Sen seeking knowledge and truth, only to realize—too late—that uncovering long-buried secrets is more terrifying than anything they have encountered and comes at a devastating cost.
Fans of the following tropes will find plenty to enjoy in Japanese Gothic: a haunted house, dual timelines, dual points of view, an isolated setting, a dark and mysterious atmosphere, visions and nightmares, psychological horror, reluctant teamwork, the supernatural, morally gray characters, and an unreliable narrator.
