First in the series on John Rain, half American, half Japanese, Vietnam war vet, hitman extraordinaire, living and working in Japan.

John starts off with a successful hit, ordered upon a Japanese political figure, and soon finds himself mired in plots from various factions racing to find an encrypted disk of information that said politician was going to hand off.

A jazz and Scotch enthusiast, John finds himself enamored of an up and coming female jazz pianist. Who just happens to be the politician's daughter, much to his surprise. Does she have the disk? Does she know where the disk is? Does she know what's on the disk?

Murder, mayhem, blood, martial arts ensue.

While the author mentions some single malt Scotches in detail, his first references caused some pause as I believe the correct spelling is Caol Ila, not Cao Lila....

I surprised myself by actually liking this book. I am not usually an assassin/spy/CIA kind of person, but this was pretty darn good. John Rain is in the business of killing for hire. He is tops in his profession and sought after for his skills. After the completion of, what he thinks, is a routine "job", he gets caught up in the aftermath, which has never happened before. The author gives us snippets of Johns life growing up as a mixed race child. We get a look at his life of military service also, the whole time the story of his latest hit is unfolding. He soon finds out that there is no honor among those he deals with and soon doesn't know who he can trust. Lots of double agents and scenes of his extraordinary fighting skills keep you on edge throughout the book. Ok i admit that he is one heck of a lucky guy with Bruce Lee super moves at times, but that was ok for me. I am definitely interested in reading the next installment of this series by Mr. Eisler. Thank you for introducing me to this genre and keeping it interesting enough to hook me for another in the series.

Primo di una serie dedicata a John Rain, ex infiltrato della CIA in Vietnam, divenuto micidiale killer, questo thriller spicca per la sua... normalita'! Senza infamia e senza lode, la lettura scorre via senza particolari sorprese su binari fin troppo lineari. John Rain puo' essere pero' un personaggio interessante in se', e forse gli si puo' dare il beneficio della seconda prova. Nota positiva per l'ambientazione giapponese che fornisce molti dettagli sugli usi e la mentalita' del posto, oltre a una interessante descrizione di Tokyo.

This series is cracking and I listened to them in those pre goodreads years.

Is it wrong to like the assassin?

I liked John Rain more than I liked the story. Well, no. I liked John Rain and I liked the story. But it took a long time to tell it. Willing to give the next in the series a try.

All assassin novels are compared against The Day of the Jackal or Shibumi. And while this one didn't quite reach the 5 star bar, I'll continue the series.

I really enjoyed this book, so much that I started it this morning and finished it this afternoon.
A thriller with a difference, the main character is an assassin working in Tokyo. The author makes the assassin likeable and very intriguing in a fast paced thriller.
I am interested to read that many of the reviewers on Goodreads consider that this series gets better so I intend to read more.

My eldest turned me onto this first of a series thriller over the Christmas holidays and I'm glad she did. Eisler is a soulful writer who takes his readers on an emotional roller coaster in this introduction to the primary antagonist John Rain.

As with most thrillers, this is not Pulitzer Prize or National Book Award material. Nevertheless, "Rain Fall" is a good little read and kept my interest throughout. The setting is unique as I don't recall ever reading anything from this genre that uses the Japanese-American cultural connection as the base premise. It actually works well and helped to solidify this as a series I want to continue reading just to learn more about something I know precious little about.

I can't really say much about the plot without providing spoilers which I always find irritating in a review. I will tell you that if you enjoy any or multiples of the following, you show pick this one up as an airplane, beach, cruise, fireplace read; Japanese culture, Japanese-American culture, Japanese politics, scotch, jazz, Vietnam, the CIA, or the martial arts.

Enjoy!

A solid example of the genre. The Rain character is a good one and you want to like him even though he's done some bad things.

This is the first book in the John Rain series. I really enjoyed the Japanese setting of the story, and the "stuck-between-two-cultures" battle of Rain. I am looking forward to reading other books in the series.

I am not a die hard fan of military, spies, assassins and their ilk type of fiction. I am, however, a die hard fan of all things Japanese and I thought it would be interesting to read about an assassin who is half Japanese, half American. This was so much better than I expected!!!! The story moved along and the military parts were not boring. I loved that the setting was in Tokyo and the author used a lot of vivid descriptions to bring the city to life (and always gave an explanation for those who do not understand the Japanese language.) This is another case of as assassin with part heart of gold, but the author made it believable and I am happy that I took a chance on reading it.

I liked this one. Made a hit-man look human. This is a good one for the UN challenge as Tokoyo is intimately detailed. The social nuances of Japanese culture is also good. I did have a bit trouble keeping up with the Japanese names.