Clouds above the Hill, a long-time best-selling novel in Japan, is now translated into English for the first time. An epic portrait of Japan in crisis, it combines graphic military history and highly readable fiction to depict an aspiring nation modernizing at breakneck speed. Acclaimed author Shiba Ryotaro devoted an entire decade of his life to this extraordinary blockbuster, which features Japans emergence onto the world stage by the early years of the 20th century.