Waiting on Wednesday: The Scent of Sake by Joyce Lebra

Waiting on Wednesday is a feature at Breaking the Spine which is, as Steph put it, "a community book lusting effort."

I knew I would want to read this book when I saw the title of it and then I read Anna's review. For some reason, I feel like Japanese culture and history will never ever cease to fascinate me and books that capture it well are of a particular interest to me. The Scent of Sake comes out on February 17th, from Avon an imprint of HarperCollins.

About the Book: She was taught to submit, to obey . . . but she dreamed of an empire.

The sole heir to the House of Omura, a venerable family of Kobe sake brewers, nineteen-year-old Rie hears but cannot heed her mother's advice: that in nineteenth-century Japan, a woman must "kill the self" or her life will be too difficult to bear. In this strict, male-dominated society, women may not even enter the brewery—and repressive tradition demands that Rie turn over her family's business to the inept philanderer she's been forced to marry. She is even expected to raise her husband's children by another woman—a geisha—so that they can eventually run the Omura enterprise.

But Rie's pride will not allow her to relinquish what is rightfully hers. With courage, cunning, brilliance, and skill, she is ready to confront every threat that arises before her—from prejudice to treachery to shipwrecks to the insidious schemes of relentless rivals—in her bold determination to forge a magnificent dynasty...and to, impossibly, succeed.

An epic and breathtaking saga that spans generations as it sweeps through the heart of a century, Joyce Lebra's The Scent of Sake is a vivid and powerful entry into another world...and an unforgettable portrait of a woman who would not let that world defeat her.