Author: Gyokaen Karyu & Saikaen Ryuko.
Title: [Doho no Ketto].
Description: Tokyo, Jiyukaku 1889 (Meiji 22). 18x12cm publisher's cloth backed colour illustrated boards (a touch of nibbling around the edges); one double page, sixteen single page and two half page illustrations by Arai Yoshimune. A rather good copy. ¶ First edition of of this modern thriller. I have little clue of what happens but when a well dressed - a la the west - young woman totes a revolver onto the front cover and faces a sword toting young woman in Japanese dress ... well, what more is there to say? The title more or less translates as 'Compatriots' Duel'. It was reprinted a few years later with a better title, Duelling Beauties (Ketto Bijin).This is a 'ball cover' (boru hyoshi, apparently a corruption of 'board') book - a signal of modernity and the Japanese equivalent of a yellowback: flimsy western style bindings with lithograph covers that rarely survive in such good shape.

Keywords: literature fiction thrillers Japan c19th women feminism