New Book

I have just published An Introduction to Shinto, a book based on the first two years or so of essays for the Mimusubi Patreon. It is available as a Kindle e-book from Amazon, from any of the various national Amazons. (The link is to the US site, because I think most potential readers are in the US, but I think it will automatically give you a link to your local site if that is different; I get one for the Japanese site, for example.)

The book, I hope, does what it says on the cover: it introduces Shinto to an English-speaking audience that knows nothing about the subject to start with. I have focused, as with the essays, on the way Shinto is practised today and its contemporary place in Japanese society, rather than on history, architecture, or myth. All three of those would make suitable topics for future books, and future essays for the Patreon, although looking at what I have written so far, the book of myths is likely to be the next one.

Amazon gets the book to be about 300 pages equivalent, which seems right to me; it is about 100,000 words, so it is a substantial introduction. If you want a very brief introduction, you can read the whole of the first chapter, which is exactly that, for free through the Look Inside feature.

I hope that people find the book interesting and useful.