If the shogun's heir is displeased, he will have Sano and his family put to death without waiting for the shogun's permission, then worry about the consequences later. This is the most significant, and most dangerous, investigation of his career. Sano is restored to the rank of chief investigator to find the culprit. In his own palace, the shogun is stabbed with a fan made of painted silk with sharp-pointed iron ribs. Then a harrowing, almost inconceivable crime takes place. Yet, Sano's dedication to the Way of the Warrior―the samurai code of honor―is undiminished. Sano's onetime friend Hirata is a reluctant conspirator in a plot against the ruling regime. His relationship with his wife Reiko is in tatters, and a bizarre new alliance between his two enemies Yanagisawa and Lord Ienobu has left him puzzled and wary. Amid the ever-treacherous intrigue in the court, Sano Ichiro has been demoted from chamberlain to a lowly patrol guard. Riveting and richly imagined, with a magnificent sense of time and place, The Iris Fan is the triumphant conclusion to Laura Joh Rowland's brilliant series of thrillers set in feudal Japan.
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