The Pure Land by Alan Spence

When it comes to national stereotypes, Japanese xenophobia is right up there with French sanctimony and Spanish lassitude. In the 1860s, when the nation's rigid isolationism was finally breached by American and British gunboat diplomacy, Japan's feuding warlords were united only by their hostility to foreigners. Any Westerner on the streets might have his head lopped off by a passing samurai. None of which was known to Tom Glover, a shipbroker's apprentice from Aberdeen, when he accepted a posting "to the ends of the earth".

On arrival in Nagasaki, the Scotsman shows a menacing ronin that he's not easily intimidated. Hard-working and ambitious, he becomes an "indispensable" cog in the Jardine Mathieson trading company, whereupon he branches out on his own, making a fortune in the emerging tea, silk and opium markets. Then it occurs to him how much the clans would benefit from Western weaponry. To realise his grand capitalist vision, Glover has to win the trust of the locals. Having toasted "British fair play" and joined the freemasons, gradually Garuba-san, as he is known, goes native. Standing at the foot of a gigantic bronze statue of the Buddha, the son of stalwart Presbyterians recalls the commandment forbidding worship of graven images; and yet, awestruck by the Buddha's benign austerity, "he felt boundaries, distinctions, dissolve, as if he were losing himself". He discovers the poems, parables and riddles of Zen, is taught how to fight with a sword (reciprocating with a simple demonstration of the Glasgae kiss), and adapts to the etiquette of courtesans.

Glover cuts quite a dash with the ladies, sometimes with long-term consequences. But there's no depth to his feelings, no sense of guilt over those whom he abandons. He demonstrates a self-absorption so pronounced that, even when looking into the eyes of a tiger, he sees his own reflection.

Alan Spence's references to Japan's rigid, esoteric codes of honour are empathetic. Underlining his sympathies is the contrast between noble samurai and cowardly British diplomats. Then again, this is "a ripping yarn, a tale of derring-do", in which action takes precedence over character. Thus battle scenes become massacres, sessions of heavy drinking and opium-smoking are rewarded by industrial-strength hangovers, and the loneliness of a Briton abroad necessitates nocturnal trips to the teahouse.

The story's real resonance lies in snapshots of Glover's descendants in the opening and penultimate chapters. The Japanese-Western amity that underpinned his life's work comes crashing down on his son, Tomasino, in 1945. Yet his Japanese-Western progeny, represented by a third generation that brings the 21st century into vivid focus, live on.