Missing in Tokyo

by Graham Marks

Overview

When his older sister Charlie vanishes while traveling through Asia, seventeen-year-old Adam decides he can do more to find her than the nonchalant police and his distraught parents. Without telling his family, he boards a plane for Tokyo. He suspects Charlie may have been involved in the twilight world of bar "hostessing"-or worse. With help from new friends, especially the intriguing and beautiful Aiko, Adam prowls the town. His search ultimately leads him to Tokyo's underbelly of gangsters and drug dealers. Will he learn the truth about his sister's disappearance before it's too late?
Also available: Zoo 1-58234-991-6 pb $8.95
Reviews "The novel's strength derives from the pulsing slice of life, cut from Tokyo's neon landscape-from the tiny, stacked bedrooms of capsule hotels to the outré costumes of roving scenesters. The stranger-in-a-strange-land motif, spiked with sexy Japanophilia and British slang, should draw literate manga fans and Anglophiles alike." -Publishers Weekly
"A vividly portrayed movie of Tokyo as seen by a sophisticated young man in his late teens. ...It's a genuine teen page-turner however, and the sex, while mostly offstage, is hot. So what do you call chick-lit for boys?"-Kirkus Reviews "The plot twists and turns in this fast-paced, intriguing novel that will keep readers guessing." -School Library Journal
"Even teens who disdain youth thrillers in favor of grittier adult fare may make an exception for this noir-tinged novel." -Booklist
Featured in "Cool New Books" section, www.teenreads.com, May

Praise for Zoo:
"Fast-paced storytelling, realistic characters, and plenty of forensic science create appeal for a wide range of readers." -VOYA
"An exciting, fast-paced thriller with realistic characters and puzzling circumstances that will keep you guessing and turning the pages." -www.Teenreads.com
About the Author
Graham Marks was a designer, editor, and jour

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781619631489
Publisher:	Bloomsbury Publishing
Publication date:	01/01/2013
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	256
File size:	2 MB
Age Range:	12 Years

About the Author

Graham Marks was a designer, editor, and journalist of children's books before becoming a writer himself. He lives in London.
Graham Marks is the freelance Children's Editor of Publishing News, and also the Creative Director of an ad agency in Covent Garden with clients including Microsoft, Hewlett Packard and Honda. He has written a number of novels for children, as well as comic strip scripts for Marvel UK, radio scripts for BBC Radio 5, and film and television tie-ins for Boxtree and BBC Worldwide. Graham lives in North London

Editorial Reviews

Charlotte, older sister of 18-year-old Adam Grey, is ostensibly taking a year off, traveling with her friend Alice. When Charlie goes missing while working in a hostess bar in Tokyo, Adam's shocked parents, already grappling with the rapid decline of his grandmother, seem to go numb. Fleeing his mother's tears, his father's "permanent mood of angry impotence" and the tightlipped local investigators, Adam withdraws funds, swipes a reserve credit card from his father's drawer and flies from Britain to Tokyo to find Charlie himself. Roughly the last two-thirds of Marks's (Zoo) novel unfold as an anxious, third-person travelogue, describing a gritty mix of working-class expats, yakuza gangsters and hip Japanese teens enthralled with Adam's blonde hair. As he falls for-and sleeps with-Aiko (a smart, scooter-driving beauty), Adam questions everything from Alice's motives in reporting Charlie's disappearance, to his loyalty to his British girlfriend. Teens expecting a denouement equivalent to the ratcheting suspense of Adam's mission might feel slightly let down (Charlie has apparently simply absconded with Alice's boyfriend). Instead, the novel's strength derives from the pulsing slice of life, cut from Tokyo's neon landscape-from the tiny, stacked bedrooms of capsule hotels to the outr costumes of roving scenesters. The stranger-in-a-strange-land motif, spiked with sexy Japanophilia and British slang, should draw literate manga fans and Anglophiles alike. Ages 12-up. (June) Copyright 2006 Reed Business Information.

Publishers Weekly

Gr 9 Up-A phone call in the middle of the night to Adam's parents changes their lives. His older sister, Charlie, is missing in Tokyo. According to Alice, her best friend and traveling companion, Charlie left Bar Belle with a male customer, never to be seen again. To make matters worse, Adam knew that his sister was working as a hostess in a gentleman's club and never shared that information with his parents. To the police, this omission looks suspicious. Frustrated with the lack of progress in the investigation, the teen, unbeknownst to his parents, jets off to the back alleys of Tokyo to find out what happened to his sister. When he catches a glimpse of Alice, she runs away from him. Confused and overwhelmed by her reaction, he decides to drown his sorrows in a local bar. The next morning he wakes up in the bed of beautiful Aiko, whom he immediately enlists in his search. A passionate relationship ensues. As the pieces of his sister's disappearance begin to fall into place, the teen finds himself mixed up in a kidnapping, the Japanese Mafia, and the Tokyo drug scene. The plot twists and turns in this fast-paced, intriguing novel that will keep readers guessing.-Angela M. Boccuzzi-Reichert, Merton Williams' Middle School, Hilton, NY Copyright 2006 Reed Business Information.

School Library Journal

Adam's older sister Charlotte-Charlie-is on an around-the-world trip with her best buddy Alice when Alice calls to say that Charlie's been kidnapped in Tokyo. Adam, an easygoing blond Londoner, who is the only family member who knew Charlie was in Japan, decides he must go there to find her. What follows is a vividly portrayed movie of Tokyo as seen by a sophisticated young man in his late teens. How Adam tries to track Charlie down makes sense, and Marks is at pains to show how what Adam does is possible, even logical. The female characters come off rather badly: Readers never actually see Charlie; Alice turns out to be the bad guy; Adam's girlfriend at home is flat and Aiko, his beauteous Japanese sex toy, is a dream fantasy. It's a genuine teen page-turner however, and the sex, while mostly offstage, is hot. So what do you call chick-lit for boys? (Fiction. YA)

Kirkus Reviews