Yuki Saito should have known something was wrong when his dad quietly walked into their steaming home tub that night -- they hadn't taken a bath together in years, although it is the Japanese custom to do so.
The teen felt awkward and got out as quickly as he could. It was a decision he would regret forever -- the next day, Yuki learned his 47-year-old father had suffered in silence about his business embroiled in massive bad debts and had chosen suicide as the only way out.
Saito's story -- told in a new book with a dozen other offspring who lost parents to suicide, mostly over money problems -- has struck a chord in this nation, where tough times are now a major force driving 31,000 people a year to take their own lives.