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"Rising Sun" is Micheal Crichton at his best. All the reasons he is one of my favorite authors are found in this book. He writes honestly, not politically correctly. The cold hard facts he states, through the eyes and ears and mouths of his characters, about the Japanese and their business practices and America's inability to respond to either, mostly out of ignorance, innefeciency, and a desire to, at whatever cost, not come across as offensive or racist, is spot on. I live in Asia full time (the Philippines) and have been to Japan, and China and South Korea and have experienced racism, as a white man, that is not only accepted in Asian culture, but practiced by the masses, and taught to children openly by parents and educators. Practices and behaviors that, thank God, are not accepted or tolerated in the west, and Crichton is NOT afraid to write about that issue and call a spade a mother lovin' spade.
And that style of writing is so refreshing to me.
I also enjoy how he wraps fact with fiction in his work, as he does in this one, so not only do you get one hell of an exciting ride with the story line, but you learn so many facts, some of which are not always comfortable (like America represents 4% of the earth's surface population, has 18% of the world economy, yet has 50% of the world's lawyers due to our legal frivolity).
This book ranks as a close second as my favorite Crichton work, first being "State of Fear."