Rising Sun - Michael Crichton

Written by Michael Crichton
Read by MacLeod Andrews
Format: MP3
Bitrate: 64 Kbps
Unabridged

Length: 11 hrs and 45 mins
Publisher: Brilliance Audio, 2015

On the forty-fifth floor of the Nakamoto tower in downtown Los Angeles—the new American headquarters of the immense Japanese conglomerate—a grand opening celebration is in full swing.

On the forty-sixth floor, in an empty conference room, the corpse of a beautiful young woman is discovered.

The investigation immediately becomes a headlong chase through a twisting maze of industrial intrigue, a no-holds-barred conflict in which control of a vital American technology is the fiercely coveted prize—and in which the Japanese saying “Business is war” takes on a terrifying reality.

“A grand maze of plot twists . . . Crichton’s gift for spinning a timely yarn is going to be enough, once again, to serve a current tenant of the bestseller list with an eviction notice.”—New York Daily News

A young American model is murdered in the corporate boardroom of Los Angeles’s Nakomoto Tower on the new skyscraper’s gala opening night. Murdered, that is, unless she was strangled while enjoying sadomasochistic sex that went too far. Nakomoto, a Japanese electronics giant, tries to hush up the embarrassing incident, setting in motion a murder investigation that serves Crichton as the platform for a clever, tough-talking, harangue on the dangers of Japanese economic competition and influence-peddling in the U.S.

Divorced LAPD lieutenant Peter Smith, who has custody of his two-year-old daughter, and hard-boiled detective John Connor, who says things like “For a Japanese, consistent behavior is not possible,” pursue the killer in a winding plot involving Japan’s attempt to gain control of the U.S. computer industry. Although Crichton’s didactic aims are often at cross-purposes with his storytelling. This entertaining, well-researched thriller cannot be easily dismissed as Japan-bashing because it raises important questions about that country’s adversarial trade strategy and our inadequate response to it. He also provides a fascinating perspective on how he thinks the Japanese view Americans–as illiterate, childish, lazy people obsessed with TV, violence and aggressive litigation….Publishers Weekly