I talked with one of my editors this week. She’s just finishing a manuscript evaluation of my third novel, The Man Terror Club. She wanted to discuss her general impressions with me and ask some questions in preparation for finalizing her written feedback. Some of our talk was about how long I’d lived in Japan (twenty-five years) and how long ago I wrote the novel (fifteen years), but then we got into the whole question of why I was writing a story about a bunch of Japanese women who’ve been abused, when I am neither Japanese nor a woman. She didn’t go as far as asking what right I have to tell that story, but she made it clear that others certainly would. She said publishing the novel could easily end my career and told me in no uncertain terms that I would be crucified. That was the word she used: crucified.