Samurai Rising: The Epic Life of Minamoto Yoshitsune

Minamoto Yoshitsune should not have been a samurai. But his story is legend in this real-life saga.

This epic warrior tale reads like a novel, but this is the true story of the greatest samurai in Japanese history.

When Yoshitsune was just a baby, his father went to war with a rival samurai family—and lost. His father was killed, his mother captured, and his surviving half-brother banished. Yoshitsune was sent away to live in a monastery. Skinny, small, and unskilled in the warrior arts, he nevertheless escaped and learned the ways of the samurai. When the time came for the Minamoto clan to rise up against their enemies, Yoshitsune answered the call. His daring feats and impossible bravery earned him immortality.

PAMELA S. TURNER is the author of Life on Earth—and Beyond, The Dolphins of Shark Bay (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt), and the Orbis Pictus Honor Book The Frog Scientist (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt). Pamela lives in Oakland, California.

Back in college GARETH HINDS sketched legendary scenes from Yoshitsune’s life—just for fun. Today he is the creator of highly acclaimed graphic-novel adaptions of Macbeth, Romeo and Juliet, The Odyssey, Beowulf, and other classics (Candlewick). Gareth lives in Washington D.C.