A chance to win one of these three great novels that will cure your book hangover
Want to stay in a world where an orphan girl growing up in an iffy situation must dodge the dangers and go along with the games played by powerful men and beautiful women, until she gets a chance to win the kind of the freedom she never dared dream of?
If you’re suffering a bit of a book hangover after finishing The Samurai’s Octopus, here’s your chance to win a novel that will scratch that itch!
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The Calamity Club
by Kathryn Stockett
Meg’s mother went out to the store one Christmas Eve and never came back. Now Meg is eleven, and one of the nearly unadoptable Big Girls at the Lafayette County Orphan Asylum, when a chance to live a better life falls in her lap. Naturally, nothing can be that easy—evildoers abound, pursuing their own agendas—but with no advantages besides her own sharp wit and honest appeal, Meg is the thread who pulls together a motley crew of women who take an audacious risk to come out on top.
If you loved seeing Yoshiwara through Birdie’s eyes and cheered her on as she tried to find family and win her freedom, you’ll also love Meg overcoming serious hurdles to do the same in 1933s Mississippi.
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The Square of Sevens
by Laura Shepherd-Robinson
The orphan girl Red must use the only thing of value she possesses—the ability to tell fortunes using an arcane system handed down to her by her father—to try and carve out a place for herself in the world. But as her fortunes rise, so do the ambitions of the powerful people surrounding her, and she must use all her wits to evade their schemes and win a future for herself.
If you loved watching Birdie duck and dive to evade the hopes and dreams and schemes of everyone seeking to use her to their own advantage, you’ll also love the way Red outsmarts her betters, against all odds.
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Memoirs of a Geisha
by Arthur Golden
Sayuri is sold to a geisha house by her impoverished father when she’s just an ignorant village girl, but through good luck and bad, she uses her natural wiles and ability to seize an opportunity to have a chance at a life others only dream of.
If you loved how Birdie surfed the waves of fate that pushed her this way and that, never letting anything deter her from her search for family and a better life, you’ll love how Sayuri faces similar triumphs and setbacks, growing into a woman with a chance to win her heart’s desire.
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This month, one lucky subscriber will get their pick!
If your email pops out of the hat on June 30th, you can choose any one of these books—ebook or paperback—and I’ll send it to you. Clicking on the book photo will take you to the Amazon page with a fuller description of each, so dive in and choose your favorite, in case you get lucky.
All Japanagram subscribers as of June 30, 2026 will be entered to win, so check the July Japanagram to see if you’ve won.
If you can’t wait, you can get any of these three novels right now (click on the book covers or links) or check out the July Japanagram to see if you won a copy. All subscribers are automatically entered to win—if you’re not yet a member of this lucky group, click this button to subscribe, and be automatically signed up to enter. It’s free!
How I pick the book giveaway winners: At the end of June, I will load all the email addresses of current Japanagram subscribers into an online random name picker and ask it to choose one lucky subscriber to get the book from this month’s review. I’ll publish the winner’s email in the next Japanagram (obscured in a way so only the subscriber will be able to recognize it as their own, of course) so check your July Japanagram to see if you won!
If you’d like to be automatically entered to win a book, subscribe!
And if you haven’t yet read The Samurai’s Octopus…
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Will this be your new favorite mystery too?
“The Samurai’s Octopus…is a truly remarkable book, one that surprised and charmed me at every turn of the page. It’s one of the most memorable books I’ve read in a long time. You’re in for a treat.”
—James Ziskin, Anthony, Barry, and Macavity Award-winning author of the Ellie Stone mysteries
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Jonelle Patrick writes novels set in Japan, and blogs at Only In Japan and The Tokyo Guide I Wish I’d Had
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