Yakuza Moon: Memoirs of a Gangster's Daughter

Deep and Eye-opening

Yakuza Moon was a solid read from beginning to end. What I did not expect, was the feeling of inspiration I felt at the end. This book visits very dark and personal topics for the author, and I actually felt very grateful to her when I finished the book. It is short, and as it was the author's first book, it was lacking a bit in literary quality. However, I strongly recommend giving this one a try.

1 out of 1 people found this review helpful.

highly recommended !

I am always on the lookout for an amazing non-fiction saga!
and YAKUZA MOON fits this to a T !!!
A must read..on so many levels!

Meh

Readable.

0 out of 1 people found this review helpful.

New Moon to Full Moon - The Evolution of a Yakuza Child to a Woman

This certainly hooked me in and kept me reading until I had read every last page. While I do not liked how so many woman in life let themselves be abused the way Tendo was, it was uplifting to read how she eventually got past that and moved herself up in the world. One word of warning - Tendo is very human and as such makes mistakes, but she keeps going on. This shows the bad side of Yakuza world for the family members rather than showing how cool or heroic the Yakuza are.

This edition has a reaction/review by Manabu Miyazaki which is also a good read.

Yakuza Moon is a MUST READ

Yakuza Moon is one of the best books I have ever read. The story kept me intact the whole time I was reading it. The trouble that Shoko went through was so surreal and nothing that I have ever heard of. She went though so much in her life and she still kept on going. Her troubles inspired me to keep going on in life. Shoko constantly left me in suspense and wanting to know what happens next in the book. Yakuza Moon is such an easy thing to read you never have to look up any words in a dictionary or online.

One thing that I didn't like about the book is that I felt that it kind of got confusing at certain points. It seemed that it sort of left out an area or forgot to mention it in the book.

I think that this is one of those books that does not get enough attention from readers. Once you open the book the story will grasp you and wont let go.

Surreal

I never knew a person like Shoko that can bare with so much in her life and still live till this day and smile. The moment I opened Yakuza moon to its first page, there was no way I could put it down. It is amazing to see that, a person with such a great respectful history can turn a total 180 and shatter a person's morals.

Shoko did not intend to live the life she did, but had to in order to, well-live. The book is intensely brutal when it came about her last moments of breath. But still, she was strong enough to overcome these physically and mentally abuses from herself and others in order to say she is the person she is today.

In almost every chapter, drug & sex was a big factor, so you can really can an idea of what kind of life she lead. To put your life in a book that can somewhat be shameful, for others to read is truly what Shoko had to overcome.

A deep and influential read

This memoir of Shoko-Tendo is a deep, heart wrenching and influential story. Growing up and being known as the daughter of a Yakuza gang leader was not easy on Shoko. Throughout Shoko's life she encounters moments of doing drugs, having sex and being violently beaten. Reading her lifelong struggles really impacted me, learning about the Yakuza gang and the nightlife of being a Yanki in Japan is really one that will shock and impact readers.
What this woman had to go trough in her life were things that some people can relate to; may it be someone who has done drugs and the feeling of not being able to stop and it taking over your life. Or being in abusive relationship and feeling like there is no way out because for some reason you are still in love with them and you feel the need to stay with that person. She also struggles with money and that is something that many people can relate to. Shoko goes through all these struggles and still manages to become a successful woman, therefore is sending readers a powerful message.
Reading this story really made me feel like I developed a connection with the author because of the way this book is written. It really shows how Shoko didn't hesitate when writing this book. She wanted people to know the struggles she went through and to send people a message that even though there will be moments in life that can make you feel like there is no more purpose, to pick yourself up and continue to strive for what you want. This book is so relatable because Shoko learns many lessons that we as readers end up learning, and the fact that she had to learn it the hard way really makes the book that much better. I would highly recommend this powerful book to readers.

Good to see what some women have gone through.

This book is more the story of a woman and the things that she has gone through because of the poor choices she made. While the story was provoking, I felt that it lacked the details of the Yakuza itself. I was intrigued to know more about the Yakuza and how it directly affected her. While she does mention the Yakuza, the gang is covered very broadly and shows the effects it has on her life and the reason she makes the decisions that she does. Consider this more of an autobiography than the workings of the Yakuza.

Good Read but little about the Yakuza gangs

This was definitely a good read and was a really honest story about Tendo. However, I was hoping that the book would shed more light on the Yakuza gang but they were only mentioned when discussing some of Tendo's ex-boyfriends and occasionally in mention of her father. I think the title and picture of the book is a little misleading.

gritty, real, and hard to read at times

Yakuza Moon is brutal, honest, and scary. Shoko Tendo takes you through her turbulent childhood and the life built around her yakuza father. She recounts the many times he came home drunk in the middle of the night and tore the house apart and later beat Shoko. Soon she has fallen in with a tough crowd and has become a yanki, what basically amounts to a juvenile delinquent. When she gets older she moves on from sniffing paint thinner and ditching school to shooting up and dating married men. She quickly becomes a kept woman who is shuffled about, never really being her own person, and all of this before she is even 23 years old......................... Yakuza Moon is hard to read at times. The almost constant abuse that Shoko went through is heartbreaking and painful to read about. It is written in such a direct manner. The hard core drug use, the different boyfriends beating her, attempted suicide, and rape is presented to the reader as simple fact, with a sort of detachment through which you can only feel horror or pity for this young woman......................... A lot of things happen off stage, as it were, and you are only treated to the highlights of a very painful past. There are incidents mentioned in passing that are never fully explained. But for the most part it does not distract from the flow of the story. The overall impression is of a young woman who went through hell but came out the other side a stronger person. This is a woman who has earned respect finally, and is not afraid to demand it........................... After everything she is strong. The world is full of people struggling to survive and overcome - striving to be the person that they always dreamed that they could be, that they hoped deep down was still inside and had not been killed off by their mistakes. Sometimes the hardest thing to overcome is yourself, the person in the mirror can be your own worst enemy and learning to put the past behind you the hardest lesson to learn in life. Yakuza Moon is a triumph simply because Shoko Tendo overcame the atrocity that her life had become ........................... ¿I think a lot about the moon,' she says. 'How it constantly waxes and wanes, just like my life with its highs and lows. I like to think of myself as having been born under a new moon. Then, in those uncertain days when I was searching for love, I guess the moon would have become a crescent. It was probably about a half-moon when I got married.' .......................... But, as the author goes one, 'Now that I¿m alone, do I warrant a full moon? Have I finally overcome my weaknesses and grown up? I¿m heading along a new path in life, but if it turns out to be a dead end, I guess I can start over with the next full moon.¿

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