The Cinderella Ballet Mystery

Never reveal the secret to a trick

Practice to perfection

Do not repeat tricks in front of the same audience

(Howard Thurston)

You know, I'm not even sure whether I have ever seen a magic show in real life myself.

After reading the phenomenal Medium last year, I knew I had to read more by Aizawa Sako, and what's a better way to start than with his debut novel? Aizawa made his debut as a professional author by winning the 19th Ayukawa Tetsuya Award with Gozen Reiji no Cendrillon ("Cendrillon at Midnight", 2009), an interconnected short story collection. It's a book that's always been lingering in my head because I really like the cover art, but I didn't even know the author of the book was named Aizawa until his name first registered with me after reading Medium. Sugawa is a very ordinary high school student, who has a very ordinary problem on his mind: he's probably in love with his classmate Torino Hatsu, but he doesn't know how to approach her. He fell in love with her when his sister brought him to a magic bar, where Hatsu happens to be working part-time. Hatsu is a wallflower in the classroom, with no real close friends and always disappearing during lunch break so she can eat all by herself, so Sugawa was absolutely stunned by her shining appearance when doing table magic for the customers at the bar and since his visit there, can't stop thinking about Hatsu. When the two come across an odd mystery at school, Sugawa notices it has parallels with the magic tricks Hatsu showed at the bar, and asks her if she can solve it, hoping they can become friends in the process. 

I  have to admit that after finishing Gozen Reiji no Cendrillon, I was a bit disappointed that this book was not an absolute masterpiece like Medium was. Of course, no author is able to create mindblowing classics one after another, so my expectations were neither realistic nor fair (especially not as this was Aizawa's debut work), but after letting some time pass before I started on this review, I found it easier to look at Gozen Reiji no Cendrillon as a work of mystery that tries to accomplish something very different, while also laying the foundation for Medium in terms of format. Like Medium, Gozen Reiji no Cendrillon is a collection of short stories, which are strongly connected to each other. Events mentioned in one story are carried over to the next, and the final of the four stories here manages to make one cohesive narrative out of the whole book by pullng various plots threads from the other three stories together to form one tapestry. The big difference however is that Gozen Reiji no Cendrillon is also written to as a YA novel. There's a lot of focus on the high school as setting, with Sugawa's attempts at wooing Hatsu, to Hatsu's attitude towards school and her classmates and we also see other characters struggle with their lives at high school. This focus on the school life of the teenage characters also form the driving force to the mystery plots of this book: most of the mysteries we see here are more-or-less everyday life mysteries, not really crimes, but less serious, but still puzzling incidents that occur at school, and often revealed to be connected with very human motives. The book is perhaps best compared to the Classic Literature Club/Hyouka series.

The opening story Karamawari Triumph ("Futile Triumph") introduces the reader to Sugawa and Hatsu, and follows Sugawa's first attempt to strike a real conversation with his silent classmate. During his hopeless attempt in the school library, the two notice that the magazines of one of the shelves of a bookcase have been put there in reverse, with the spine inwards. Only one of the magazines there is placed correctly, with the spine to the outside, but why would anyone pull such a weird prank? The odd sight reminds Sugawa of one of the card tricks Hatsu showed and he decides to involve Hatsu in the mystery and ask if she can solve it with her knowledge of magic in an attempt to become friends with her. I like how the mystery of someone could quickly turn all the magazines in the shelf around is solved: a good look at the physical state of the "crime scene" allows the attentive reader to deduce how the magic was accomplished. And like a magic trick, it's deceivingly simple, yet capable of fooling you. The road from that point to the who, and especially why has fewer clues, and I think one extra step there in the logic would've made it a much better story.

Kyouchuu Card Stab ("Card Stab in the Heart") starts with a small private table magic show by Hatsu in the music room for two classmates and a senior student. After the show in which Hatsu uses a knife, they all leave except for the senior student, who has to practice for a piano contest. On her way home, Hatsu remembers she left her knife in the music room, so she returns there together with Sugawa, only to find an empty music room, as the senior student has gone to the bathroom. But to their shock, they find that someone has used Hatsu's knife to damage a table, carving three "F"s on the table surface. Who would do this and why? This time a tale that focuses more strongly on the reasons why someone would leave such a message on the table. Ultimately, it's not really a story where the reader is expected to be able to solve it before Hatsu does, but it works perfectly fine as a school drama mystery.

In Ate ni Naranai Predictor ("Untrustworthy Predictor"), Sugawa picks up a notebook of Itakura, a classmate who is known for her fortune-telling. He notices a list of classmates in a specific order, but when the grades for their English test are announced, he realizes that the list in Itakura's notebook corresponds exactly to the people with the best grades for this test. She appears to have real fortune-telling powers and she even claims she has seen the ghost of a student who committed suicide last year. Sugawa at first doesn't believe in the ghost, until he sees a ghostly figure in a locked classroom, but when they open the door, they find it empty! Two incidents that are not directly connected save for Itakura as a lynchpin plot figure. The trick with the list of students is simple, but very magic-like and it makes good use of very natural (wrong) assumptions of people. The disappearing ghost from the classroom has a very simple explanation in terms of mechanics (how it was done), but the explanation for it is fantastic: it's very specific to the school setting and both original and convincing.

Anata no Tame no Wild Card ("Wild Card For You") is the final story and revolves around the ghost of the girl who committed suicide last year. Someone has been using her account to post on the school message board, but why? This story is more focused on fleshing out the characters, with Sugawa finally learning more about Hatsu's past from a classmate and all kinds of minor references regarding the various characters who appeared in previous stories all coming together to form one single narrative thread. As a mystery story, I didn't find it too exciting, but as the finale to a YA school drama with a mystery-theme, it's okay. 

For the readers looking for a YA school drama mystery, Gozen Reiji no Cendrillon is a safe and entertaining read: the individual stories have some interesting ideas for mystery plots, while the overall story manages to portray interesting characters with Hatsu, Sugawa and their classmates as they spend their days at school. It's written in a way I think that even those who don't like mystery novels can enjoy it as a YA novel, but like I mentioned earlier, I wouldn't have minded it if had been a bit more mystery-oriented, as sometimes the core mystery plots felt just one or two elements short of becoming far more impressive experiences. There's a second volume out, which I might try out too.

Original Japanese title(s): 相沢沙呼『午前零時のサンドリヨン』:「空回りトライアンフ」/「胸中カード・スタッブ」/「あてにならないプレディクタ」/「あなたのためのワイルド・カード」