The 47th Samurai
Bob Lee Swagger and Philip Yano are bound together by a single moment at
Iwo Jima, 1945, when their fathers, two brave fighters on opposite
sides, met in the bloody and chaotic battle for the island. Only Earl
Swagger survived.
More than sixty years later, Yano comes to America to honor the legacy
of his heroic father by recovering the sword he used in the battle. His
search has led him to Crazy Horse, Idaho, where Bob Lee, ex-marine and
Vietnam veteran, has settled into a restless retirement and immediately
pledges himself to Yano's quest.
Bob Lee finds the sword and delivers it to Yano in Tokyo. On inspection,
they discover that it is not a standard WWII blade, but a legendary
shin-shinto katana, an artifact of the nation. It is priceless but worth
killing for. Suddenly Bob is at the center of a series of terrible
crimes he barely understands but vows to avenge. And to do so, he throws
himself into the world of the samurai, Tokyo's dark, criminal yakuza
underworld, and the unwritten rules of Japanese culture.
Night of Thunder
Woe unto he who crosses Bob Lee Swagger, especially when his daughter's
life is at stake. Forced off the road and into a crash that leaves her
in a coma, clinging to life, reporter Nikki Swagger had begun to peel
back the onion of a Southernfried conspiracy bubbling with all the
angst, resentment, and dysfunction that Dixie gangsters can muster. An
ancient, violent crime clan, a possibly corrupt law enforcement
structure, gunmen of all stripes and shapes, and deranged evangelicals
rear their ugly heads and will live to rue the day they targeted the
wrong man's daughter. It's what you call your big-time bad career move.
All of it is set against the backdrop of excitement and insanity that
only a weeklong NASCAR event can bring to the backwoods of a town as
seemingly sleepy as Bristol, Tennessee.
