At the mention of international intrigue and espionage, we naturally think of dashing secret agents who play roulette in Monacco while dressed in sparkling white dinner jackets. If the story involves a mad dictator, we expect his adversary to be a clever and precise dandy, whose smart lip can undo th
Jane Austen has been reincarnated in the personage of Kazuo Ishiguro. The great novelist of early-nineteenth-century English manners, who observed the moral inconsistencies of the nobility and argued for a form of social meritocracy, could not have hoped for a more loyal and perfect heir to her legac
Sen Yen is the standard monetary measurement in Japan. That's 1,000 smackaroos --about ten dollars -- or an all-you-can eat platter of lunchtime sushi if you're living in Tokyo with a limited budget. If you look closely at the face of the bill that might pay for tomorrow's buffet, you will see a pict