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      To my husband, Len LaBrae, whose steadfast loyalty

      and belief in me makes him my perfect samurai.

      ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

      I have always believed Japan is a land of contrasts. Reserved, quiet and silky on the one hand. On the other, erotic, adventurous and mysterious in the sensual ways of the Far East.

      It is also the land of samurai. Bold, dedicated fighters who followed the way of the warrior known as Bushidō: loyalty, duty, self-respect, honor. The samurai are well-known in the West and recently we have seen female samurai celebrated in pop culture. I applaud this retelling of historical fact in a modern context since samurai women were also schooled in the way of the warrior and often fought alongside their men in battle.

      To my knowledge, no female gaijin, foreigner, has ever become samurai. The word itself is gender specific and refers to trained male warriors. The idea of a western woman entering this world may be off-putting to some, but the thought has always intrigued me. Would she have the strength and fortitude, both physical and mental, to undergo the rigorous training required to become samurai? Could she peel away the outer layer of samurai life so often portrayed in books and films as strife and rebellion and see the inner beauty and passion that it takes to become a warrior? I have tried to answer this question in The Blonde Samurai.

      As is the way of the Japanese, this story came about as a group effort. I wish to thank my wonderful editor, Susan Swinwood, for believing in me and encouraging me to take a bold step forward and tell the story of the blonde samurai.

      And thank you to my dearest friend and agent, Roberta Brown, who sparked the idea of this book with her keen sense of story and her undying faith in me.

      PREFACE

       San Francisco

       15 September, 1876

      ’Tis not an easy task I have, dear lady reader, to respond to the vicious gossip spread about me through Mayfair drawing rooms since I returned to England. Whispers of euphoric nights with not one but two men pleasuring me; mysterious items to soothe a woman’s burning need for clitoral touch and fill her with orgasmic bliss; the erotic game of domination with girls strapped down and flogged upon their bare buttocks. Did I take part in these wild imaginings? Or are they merely tales fabricated by a besotted male scribbler to sell his stories and make his fortune?

      You be the judge as you continue to read, and I hope you will, for pages and pages of erotic delights await you. What is undisputed is that I ran away from my husband and disappeared. Some say I went mad and was confined to an asylum. Others insist I entered a convent. Neither is true, but the scandal I provoked shook the standards of bland respectability and sobriety that govern the upper class and started nonstop discussions about what they deemed to be my outrageous behavior and what should be done about it.

      Done about it? As if they alone exist on a lofty plane and rule all those below. I subscribed to no such rules and they shunned me for it. I will shock you further, for I shall begin my story with a confession, one that will titillate you and give you another reason to speculate whether what you’ve heard whispered about me is true. ’Tis a fact that I, a spirited daughter of Erin by way of America, came to London in the summer of 1872 seeking a titled match. Be it known my looks were plain and my opinions brash, sending my marital prospects into discord among my suitors, though for reasons I shall make clear in these pages, I married well. Yet the first man I took to my bed after my wedding night was not my husband—or yours—but one of the most mysterious, elusive and enigmatic men in all Japan. A samurai.

      His name was Shintaro.

      I shall never forget the moment the tall, muscular samurai swept into the room, his heavy walk making the wooden floor tremble, his presence commanding, electrifying, his melodic, deep voice speaking to me in his native tongue about waterfalls and flowers and the gods as if he was a poet and could produce an alchemy of words to create harmony between us. I burned with such desire I could not catch my breath. All I wanted was him. Bold, handsome he was, and as persuasive as the wind nudging a morning glory up the vine with his heated breath, exposing her to the sun, then seducing her to open up to him and live her vivid, unspoken dreams in his arms.

      I knew Shintaro as a man with a deep passion for everything artistic and refined, including the grace and repose of the erotic “spring drawings.” He took great joy in demonstrating to me the sexual acts depicted upon these woodblock prints, down to the most exquisite, savory detail. Yet as a member of the warrior class, he harbored an intensity for warfare and honor and adhered to their strict sense of personal loyalty with a readiness to fight and die without hesitation; he also possessed a readiness to make love to me with the same vigor, his need for me burned indelibly into his soul. When I was with him, my spirit was as light as a cherry blossom floating slowly to earth, its pure fragrance scenting the passion of our union with a fresh innocence, yet hiding no thorns under its petals like the English rose.

      Then a great tragedy came upon us and I was forced to leave Japan and return to London. Not an easy venture for me, dear lady reader. I harbored a profound

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