Joseph Cronin has been living in Japan for more than thirty years. His previous books include "Freethinker: the Autobiography of Nishimura Isaku" (2010) and "The Life of Seinosuke: Dr. Oishi and the High Treason Incident: Second Edition" (2014). Cronin's latest research has been on the Japanologist Basil Hall Chamberlain. He contributed an essay titled "Basil Hall Chamberlain's 'Things Japanese' and 'The Invention of a New Religion': A Critique of Bushido" to the book "Britain & Japan: Biographical Portraits, Vol. X" (2016). Cronin has also been researching Harry J. Griffiths (1882-1944), the Kobe publisher of books under the imprint J.L. Thompson. Griffiths was the publisher of the fifth and sixth editions of Chamberlain's encyclopaedic Things Japanese.