Total pages in book: 160
Estimated words: 161615 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 808(@200wpm)___ 646(@250wpm)___ 539(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 161615 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 808(@200wpm)___ 646(@250wpm)___ 539(@300wpm)
My chest felt too tight, too full.
Gratitude, love, disbelief—all of it tangled together.
Alright. Alright. Relax. You’ve got shit to do before the Dragon wakes up.
Chapter ten
Her Weapons
Nyomi
Minutes later, I pushed open the door to my office.
The guards remained outside of my office.
I glanced at my phone.
7:40 AM.
Reo's deadline echoed in my head—one hour. That meant I had until 8:30 to explore this office, check my messages, grab what I needed, and return to Kenji's bed.
Plenty of time.
I pocketed my phone and looked up at the shelves.
Oh my God.
The space took my breath away all over again.
Floor-to-ceiling windows overlooking the ocean, waves crashing against rocks in the distance.
A massive desk positioned perfectly to catch the morning light. And shelves—beautiful, floor-to-ceiling shelves that had been empty just days ago—now completely lined with books.
I stopped in the doorway.
Oh my God.
The shelves weren't just filled.
They were curated.
I headed straight over there and ran my fingers along the spines. My heart started racing as I recognized title after title from the list I'd given Sako barely seventy-two hours ago.
The Art of Memoir by Mary Karr—the Bible for memoir writers.
I pulled it off the shelf, flipping it open to find it was a first edition, signed.
Well damn, Sako. I didn’t need the most expensive, collector’s item. I just wanted it as a resource.
My hands trembled.
I would have to show him my appreciation when I saw him.
I scanned the rest of the books.
Next to it: Bird by Bird by Anne Lamott, On Writing by Stephen King, and The Situation and the Story by Vivian Gornick.
Every single craft book I'd been meaning to buy but couldn't justify the expense.
I moved to the next shelf.
Tell It Slant: Writing and Shaping Creative Nonfiction by Brenda Miller and Suzanne Paola. In Fact: The Best of Creative Nonfiction. The New New Journalism edited by Robert Boynton.
"He got the books on my list and then others too," I whispered to myself.
The next section made my throat tighten.
Sex industry research. The books I'd been trying to track down for months, some of them out of print or difficult to find in English.
Playing the Whore: The Work of Sex Work by Melissa Gira Grant.
Paying for It by Chester Brown—a graphic memoir I'd been dying to read.
Sex Work: Writings by Women in the Sex Industry edited by Frédérique Delacoste and Priscilla Alexander.
And then—oh God—Pink Box: Inside Japan's Sex Clubs by Joan Sinclair. I'd been searching for this book for over a year. It was rare, expensive, nearly impossible to find.
I pulled it off the shelf with shaking hands.
The book was pristine.
A first edition.
And tucked inside the front cover was a small note in elegant handwriting:
For the Tiger's research. —J.S.
My vision blurred with tears.
So. . .somebody just. . .went to the author’s house, told them what it was for, and got the book? Jesus Christ! This is. . .amazing.
I blinked rapidly and kept moving along the shelves, unable to stop myself.
There was an entire section on investigative journalism: All the President's Men, The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, and Bad Blood by John Carreyrou. Books about how to chase a story, how to verify sources, how to write truth that people didn't want told.
Another section on memoir craft specifically: Know My Name by Chanel Miller, Educated by Tara Westover, The Liars' Club by Mary Karr, When Breath Becomes Air by Paul Kalanithi.
I pulled out Know My Name, holding it to my chest.
These weren't just books.
They were a blueprint.
A roadmap.
Books that had given me the permission to tell the stories that mattered.
The next shelf held books on Japanese culture and history—context I'd need for both projects. Geisha: A Life by Mineko Iwasaki. Tokyo Vice by Jake Adelstein. The Chrysanthemum and the Sword by Ruth Benedict.
And at the very end, tucked into the corner like a secret: Writing Down the Bones by Natalie Goldberg and If You Want to Write by Brenda Ueland—two books about the spiritual practice of writing, about trusting your voice, about not being afraid.
I sank into the chair at my desk, surrounded by hundreds—maybe thousands—of dollars worth of books. Books that someone had carefully selected, ordered, shipped across the world in a matter of days.
Books that said. . .
Kenji believes your work matters. Your voice matters. Here are the tools you need.
I found a letter on the third shelf and read it.
Nyomi,
I took the liberty of adding a few titles I thought might be helpful for your research. If you need anything else, please don't hesitate to ask.
The Dragon insisted.
He said his writer needs her weapons.
—Sako.
I laughed. It was a broken, overwhelmed sound.
His writer needs her weapons.
I set the letter down and walked back to the shelves, running my hand along the spines again, slower this time. Taking them in.
The Elements of Style. Draft No. 4 by John McPhee.
Several Short Sentences About Writing by Verlyn Klinkenborg.