Mark Brazil's name has come to be associated with the ornithology of Asia, and I have benefitted greatly from his previous works, Birds of East Asia and Birds of Japan. Brazil now resides in Hokkaido and is well qualified to write this wonderful account of the natural history of the Japanese archipelago, which stretches for more than 3,000 km from the subarctic barrens at the northern tip of Hokkaido, to the subtropical zones of the outer islands in the south.
