Book excerpt: Japanese novelist Ibuse Masuji (1898-1993) is best known for his 1966 novel Kuroi Ame (published in English as Black Rain), which detailed the tragic aftermath of the nuclear bombing of Hiroshima. With Ibuse Masuji, Anthony Liman, Ibuse's lifelong friend and a noted scholar of Japanese literature and history, has written a lively and creative critical biography of the author. Liman's highly personal style delivers a vivid insider's picture of Ibuse's life, while also situating his writings and his career in the larger context of Japanese culture of the period. Featuring incisive readings of Ibuse's major works, Ibuse Masuji will be indispensable to scholars of twentieth-century Japanese literature and culture.