The main character, Rosamund is a missionary that finds herself shipwrecked in Japan and is promptly raped on the beach by the wandering young Samurai Goemon. She escapes an escape that she found disturbingly pleasurabe to be captured by a band of roving thugs who tatoo her and sell her to a brothel .... The author than takes us on the journey that both Rosamund and Goemun must take to find themselves, and each other, while each deal with the complexities of an ancient Japanese culture.
This is not the kind of erotic story that one just goes to the good sections but rather the story itself must be read and understood to get the full enjoyment of the book ....