Angel Night

Buried and drowned in time

All that’s left are memories

Just as you remember too

We used to be angels then

"We Used To Be Angels" (Kageyama Hironobu)

Finished Alliance of the Golden Witch, so I added my thoughts on the new information/events regarding the Rokkenjima murders shown in that episode to the Umineko no Naku koro ni playthrough memo. Will probably write something up on the Question Arc soon!

A murder of crows and a parliament of rooks sound nice, but I've never been a fan of a host or pinhead of angels. A flock of angels works for this novel, though I also played with "a heaven of angels" and "a salvation of angels" in my head...

Without a warning, they appeared from heaven five years ago. Humanoid, faceless beings with wings on their backs descended from the skies in a ray of light. They flew high above the humans, until they suddenly swooped down and started grabbing certain people. The humans were burned alive and taken away into the darkness. People instinctively understood what these beings were: Angels. With time, human kind learned the one absolute rule: any human who kills more than one person, is taken away by the angels to hell. In the five years since, angels have become part of the 'normal' life of the humans. They learned that the angels usually act very smilar to birds, moving in flocks and not being human-shy at all. In fact, they even have a sweet tooth and are easily lured with sugar. Angels do not harm humans who have not violated the Rule and are very meek. Eventually, scientists even dared to kill an angel and cut it open to examine it, though they learned very few about its anatomy. All they knew for sure was that nobody was allowed to kill two humans or more any more and that hell was waiting for those who dared. This had huge effects on society: the number of serial murders obviously diminished, as people either didn't want to be taken by the angels to hell, or the few people who dared would be visited immediately by angels after their second murder, preventing further murders. Some people didn't care about hell, and decided they might as well try and kill as many as possible in one go, if angels are going to take them anyway. Whether the arrival of angels was for good or not, nobody knows.

Aogishi Kogare once ran a thriving detective agency with a talented team, but after the arrival of the angels, he became what's merely a shadow of the shining figure he once was. Gone are the days that he worked on high profile serial murder cases and he basically only takes just enough minor jobs to earn a living now. After taking care of a case involving a stalker for the wealthy Tsuneki Ougai, Aogishi is invited by this giant in the food industry to his private island Tokoyojima with the enigmatic question "Don't you want to know whether there really is a heaven?".  Tsuneki is a fanatical admirer of the angels and bought Tokoyojima because an unusual large amount of angels that tend to live around here. Other guests to Tokoyojima include Amasawa Tadashi, the leading expert on angel studies and Souba Yukisugi, a former weapon manufacturer who succesfully made transformed his business to not sell a product especially designed to kill people, as demand for weapons plummeted after the descent of the angels. Aogishi soon learns to regret his trip to the island due to Tsuneki's almost maniacal belief in the angels, but the boat to pick them up won't come until a few days. On the morning of the second day of his arrival however, it is discovered that their host Tsuneki has been stabbed to death in his private rooms last night. It seems there are too few clues to determine which of the other guests committed the murder, but the remaining people on the island feel relatively safe, because they know the murderer can not commit a second murder without being taken by the angels. But the following day, another murder occurs, and then another.... Shasendou Yuuki's Rakuen to wa Tantei no Fuzai nari ("Paradise is the Absence of Detectives", 2020) poses the question: how is a person able to commit a series of murders when even heaven won't allow that?

Sometimes you just know you want to read a book with one quick look at the premise: this is one of them. I honestly had never come across the name of the author Shasendou Yuuki before, but the moment I read about the angelic rule of no more than one murder and that the mystery revolved around a case where the culprit did manage to kill multiple people, the book jumped on top of the to-read list, because come on, it's one of the most exciting story premises I've heard about! It's hardly a secret nowadays that I love mystery stories that have a supernatural/fantasy element to them (as long as it's incorporated in a proper puzzle plot), from time travel to being able to communicate with youkai, but an universal, natural law that has people automatically taken to hell the moment they commit their second murder, is both original and audicious, and I couldn't wait to see what would be done with it.

Though, admittedly, it takes a while to get there. A fair amount of the first half of the novel is used to introduce the reader to the new, angel-filled world and also to explore protagonist Aogishi's past, whose life changed completely due to the descent of the angels. The real-time narrative about the murders on Tokoyojima is often interrupted by flashback segments. These segments are necessary because they help detail how the rule of "no more than one murder" works exactly and what humanity knows about the angels, but taken together, these introductory parts do mean it takes a while for the mystery plot to get rolling properly. The protagonist Aogishi is presented as a character with a trauma, who has become a detective who is actually very reluctant to get involved in this case, and a lot of the novel is also dedicated to portraying him as a figure in pain who doesn't quite know how to deal with the new world. Your mileage may vary on how tolerable you find the story' s focus on Aogishi's attitude of "I don't want to!" and everyone's "But you must!" response. 

The story does do a somewhat lacklustre job at 'proving' to the reader that hell exists: people just instinctively know that the angels take sinners to hell, which is why people become more reluctant in committing murders and as as the reader, you just have to accept that the idea of hell is accepted by everyone involved. But wherever they are taken, it's an undeniable fact that sinners are taken away from this world by the faceless angels. There's an atmosphere of dread throughout the novel: the angels might be taking murderers away, but are other sins "forgiven"? If there's a hell, does that means there's a heaven? And why did the angels suddenly appear five years ago, and does that mean that "a second impact" could also occur in the future, changing the rules again? This new "reality" where people face a certain uncertainty is a vital part of the novel and is integral to the mystery plot.

Once the story really gets going and we are trying to solve the mystery of a series of murders occuring in a world where it's physically impossible to commit multiple murders, we get to the good stuff. While most of the murders are committed in very ordinary manners (stabbings etc.) and they could theoretically could've been committed by most of the persons residing on the island, it's the question of how there could be more than one murder occuring here, without any of the others being taken by the angels. The main problem is that in this world, angels will appear to take you away to hell the moment you have killed your second person, but in Rakuen to wa Tantei no Fuzai nari, nobody is seen taken by the angels even after the second or third murder. Of course, the possibility is raised that perhaps that everyone on the island just decided to kill exactly one other person because in that way, nobody would be taken by an angel ('the first one is free of charge!'), but it's obviously not very likely that half of the cast just decided to kill the other half of the cast right now right then. So how was it possible for the murderer to commit more than one murder without any consequences? Due the specifics of the rule, it's likely most readers will have some idea of what's going on, but still, Rakuen to wa Tantei no Fuzai nari is very nicely plotted mystery, with genuinely clever surprises here and there that make the best of the unique world of this novel.

Whenever I read a mystery novel with a supernatural/fantasy theme, the question I always ask myself is whether the supernatural elements are really used to create a situation that couldn't occur in a "realistic" world. 'Graphical swaps' where it turns that something like "magical traces" work functionally exactly the same as fingerprints is of course not satisfying at all. Rakuen to wa Tantei no Fuzai nari is a example of where the supernatural is used well, as indeed, the whole plot of this novel only works within this unique world, where the knowledge that there are angels flying around everywhere who can come down and get you the moment when "if (kill > 1) go to hell", influences the actions of both the culprit and all the other characters in the story. You might be able to guess who the murderer is fairly early on (the motive isn't really well foreshadowed by the way), but figuring out how the whole plot was carried out is a lot trickier, and I really liked how the murderer succeeded in committing more than one murder without being carried away by the angels. I had some suspicions about how the presence of the angels could be used for these murders, but even I have to admit I hadn't expected some of the clever ways in which the existence of these celestial beings were tied to the main murder plot: this is best seen in one of the later murders, where author Shasendou suddenly uses the concept of the angels in a completely different manner than I had expected, even though it was properly hinted at.  I was completely fooled there.

Rakuen to wa Tantei no Fuzai nari is a novel with a highly original and unique premise and sticks with it until the very last page of the book. It is a mystery that truly could only have occured in a world with angels, and the way it uses one seemingly simple rule to create a captivating series of murders is absolutely great. The book can be slow at times, but it's very atmosheric, and the book does really profit from the detailed look at a world which can now actually see sinners being taken away by heavenly creatures. Another good example of why mystery novels don't need to be "realistic" to be fun, challenging and yet still fair.

Original Japanese title(s):  斜線堂有紀『楽園とは探偵の不在なり』