Matt is an American ex-pat living in Japan and, according the bio on his webpage, his first career was working in the US Patent and Trademark Office helping patent attorneys understand various Japanese intellectual property. As such, he understands what makes Japan intriguing to non-Japanese and also has an excellent ability to trace back through history and distill the essence of subjects.

There is a lot of history in this book. Matt can really dig into a topic and periodically goes so deep down a rabbit hole you're not really sure what story he's setting up. You walk away from these threads with a great understanding of the historical context that lead people to formulate ideas, which ultimately turned into the products that folks in the west would recognize.

He spends a lot of pages describing Japan's political history, which weaves its way into the politics of the US in surprising ways. He makes a compelling case that the United States and Japan are tied at the hip and I even learned a number of things about US political phenomena that I was not aware of.

Even though I would describe myself as a Japanophile who has studied Japan since I was a child, I learned an enormous amount of information. The book is fun read, packed with photos and amusing anecdotes. Highly recommended for any nerds or people with even a feint interest in Japan and the Japanese.