Rei Shimura

Rei Shimura is a fictional amateur sleuth and antiques expert who features in a series of mystery novels written by Sujata Massey. Her character is first introduced in the novel "The Salarymans's Wife", in which she unravels the murder of a woman on a sight-seeing trip

Character history

Born in San Francisco, California, Rei Shimura was raised in the United States by her Japanese father and (Caucasian) American mother before emigrating to Tokyo. While in Japan, she worked in a succession of jobs, ranging from columnist for the "Gaijin Times" to antiques dealer.

Rei Shimura is described as appearing more Japanese than Caucasian, and she is often mistaken to be of full Japanese ancestry when in the United States. In Japan, she is regarded as a foreigner despite her fluent Japanese and she still has difficulty with the written language.

Rei Shimura's mother is a member of the influential Howard family, but in "The Pearl Diver" Massey indicates that only one member of this family, Kendall Howard, reaches out to Rei when she moves to Washington D.C. All of her father's family live in Japan, and Rei has a close relationship with her cousin, Tom Shimura, and her aunt, Norie.