The assassination of Sakamoto Ryōma on the eve of a revolution of his own design was probably the most tragic event of the Meiji Restoration. And certainly it was one of the most historically significant assassinations in what was thus far the most bloody and tumultuous period in Japanese history (1853-1868). In the Prologue of my novel, Ryoma: Life of a Renaissance Samurai (Ridgeback Press, 1999), I describe Ryōma as follows: “outlaw-samurai, pistol-bearing swordsman, freedom-fighter, pioneering naval commander, entrepreneur and statesman, a youth ahead of his time with an imagination as boundless as the Pacific Ocean–was a leader in the revolution to overthrow the shogunate and form a unified democracy in Japan.”

In my new book, Samurai Assassins, the printed edition of which was released today, I wrote, “To fully understand the scale of Ryōma’s tragedy, we must realize that he was a visionary and a genius—if genius means to conceive of original ideas and to have the courage and audacity to bring them to fruition.”

Part III of Samurai Assassins, is titled “The Assassination of Sakamoto Ryōma” His murder is shrouded in mystery. Samurai Assassins provides the first in-depth study of the tragic event in English, based mostly on primary sources.