Pacific Rift

Book excerpt: The author of "Liar's Poker" aims his skewering wit at the so-called cultural clash between Japan and the United States. This is a very different kind of book on U.S.-Japanese business relations. In search of answers, Michael Lewis hits the road to report on the travails of two businessmen: one a rollicking American insurance agent who works in Tokyo, the other a Harvard-educated Japanese man employed by Mitsui Real Estate in New York City. From the Ginza hostess bars of Tokyo to the "wine-bottle" gangs of Times Square, Lewis dramatizes tragicomic collisions between the two cultures and the basic misconceptions that Americans and Japanese have about each other.