Birds of a Feather

Leave no black plume as a token of that lie thy soul hath spoken! 

 Leave my loneliness unbroken!—quit the bust above my door! 

Take thy beak from out my heart, and take thy form from off my door!” 

Quoth the Raven “Nevermore.”

"The Raven"

So the title of this books refers to crows and not ravens as we start with a scene of a murder of crows (and ravens usually move in pairs). The same kanji character is also used in Soanoshiro/Soanojo, a location in Maya Yutaka's first novel and the title of Kyoto University Mystery Club's annual publication, but there the same kanji refers to a raven...

Wanting to learn the reason why his younger brother got himself murdered, Kain travels deep in the mountains to locate a small, isolated village without a name and not indicated on any maps. Abel disappeared soon after Kain got married, but returned half a year ago, but soon met his death. Abel had been living in this village for some time, and Kain suspects the reason for Abel's demise may lie in his stay here. Kain eventually manages to make his way to the hidden village, but barely: on the way, he's nearly killed by a murder of crows, pecking viciously at him and even making him pass out as he tried to flee from the attack. When he awakens, he finds himself being taken care of in the village, as Senbon Kashiragi found him lying heavily injured in the outskirts of the village. Kashiragi is a kind man, and lets Kain stay in his home and Kain also meets his wife Fuyuhi, son Kazura and daughter Semiko. Kain keeps the true reason for his arrival at the village a secret for now, but he soon learns the peculiarities of the village where Abel spent some months living. The village is completely isolated from the outside world, with about 1000 inhabitants of whom most are of course farmers. A river seperates the village in an east and west side, and the two sides don't mingle too much, and there's even a bit of a power struggle going on between the two sides. But there's an absolute authority that stands even above these sides: in the north of the village stands the palace of Ookagami, the god of flesh and blood who reigns over the village. The whole village worships Ookagami, who watches over them. His authority is absolute, which is one of the reasons why the village is so isolated: while there is no rule saying villagers can't leave the village, the mountains are considered holy territory belonging to Ookagami, and save for sanctioned hunters, nobody is allowed to enter the mountains, and it just happens the whole village is surrounded by mountains. 

The village has developed for generations without real contact with the outside world, though they are aware of it existing, and in the past some "Outsiders" have made their way to the villages just like Kain and Abel. While the village is usually not very welcoming to outsiders, some have managed to settle in the village. Abel too himself had become a well-respected member of the community and even became a Guardsman to Ookagami, one of the most respected functions in the village. Pretending to be interested in other Outsiders in the village, Kain asks more about Abel's life here, and learns that he suddenly left the village about half a year ago, even though he was a Guardsman and quite beloved by people on both sides of the river. Kain starts suspecting Abel being a Guardsman might be the reason why he got killed, though he can't understand why. Meanwhile, Kain himself isn't really making himself popular in the village by him poking around and while the Senbons are glad to have him, many are not shy to tell him to leave. When one man, who had a rivalry with Abel, is found murdered in the village, people naturally start to look suspiciously at Kain, but on the other hand, they also are fairly sure he didn't do it. Why? Because if someone murders someone else in this village, a mark will appear on the hand of the murderer. It is the will of Ookagami, and while Ookagami will not judge upon the murderer, everyone else will be able to identify the murderer because the appearance of the mark is fact and nobody dares to murder someone else in this village. But is that really so? As Kain tries to figure out Abel's death and his connections to the village, he finds the village perhaps far more dangerous than he first suspected in Maya Yutaka's Karasu ("The Crows", 1997).

Karasu is the fifth novel in the Maya's Mercator Ayu series. The last Mercator novel (not short story collection) I read was the second one, Natsu to Fuyu no Sonata ("A Sonata for Summer and Winter" AKA "Parzival" 1993), which was a fever-dream-esque catastrophic deconstruction of the closed circle murder mystery on an island. It was for me, the "books you don't to read but do want to have read"-type of book. Karasu shares some themes with Natsu to Fuyu no Sonata, but in a much more subdued way, being closer to a conventional detective story, without ever forgetting the deconstructive modes Maya specializes in. The result is a book that is perhaps not as powerful and memorable as Natsu to Fuyu no Sonata, but probably a lot more enjoyable as a conventional detective story.

The most memorable part of this book is definitely the village: it is a creepy, isolated community which has human aspects to it, but also horribly, cold sides as one would perhaps expect from such a introverted community hidden in the mountains. There is a distinct, almost fantasy-like atmosphere, which is certainly not idyllic or pictoresque, but it feels very detached from our reality, and yet very real in how feudal the whole village dynamics work. It is a very different mood compared to more (fever-)dream-like atmosphere of Natsu to Fuyu no Sonata, but this "detached from reality" feeling is certainly one reason why I was very much reminded of that book.  But with the story also focusing a lot on the political power struggles between the various chieftains in the village, you are quickly reminded of the Kindaichi novels, or a village where Toujou Genya would do his folklore research. Indeed, the latter is the series I was reminded of the most, as the absolute belief in Ookagami and his rules are what make this village so unique. Indeed, a lot of the mystery arises from the fact the rules are considered absolute in this village, which in turn influence the (possible) actions of the suspects. How could someone have killed Abel after he had left the village and returned to the outside world, if nobody is allowed to set foot in the mountains and everyone believes in that rule and does not violate it? Why would anyone risk killing someone else, if they know a mark will appear on their hand, branding them a murderer? These are elements that usually are not at play in a normal detective story, but this is not a normal setting, and these religious rules thus create a very interesting and original setting for a mystery.

Due to the slow pace of the book and the focus on depicting the village in such detail, it does mean the reader has to be patient if they want to focus on the mystery. It takes a lot of time for the murders to occur, so the first half or so, we're just exploring the village, its beliefs, customs and rites and meeting some of the important faces here. Even after the murders have occured, it's not like Kain can play detective openly all the time, as a lot of people suspect him, as the Outsider, to be the murderer, so it's definitely not an investigation-focused detective, and at times, I was even reminded of Yatsu Haka Mura (The Village of Eight Graves), which felt similar with Tatsuya appearing in an isolated village, murders happening and him slowly turning into the main suspect. Only this book is still more mystery-focused compared to the more adventure-focused Yatsu Haka Mura. There is a secondary plotline which follows a young boy living in the village also trying to learn more about the deaths in the village, which adds a bit more suspense and adds a nice different view on the events, working very well as a contrast to Kain's POV.

I already mentioned this is a Mercator book by the way, and Mercator Ayu's appearance in this story was quite surprising. He appears roaming around in the village, even though it appears only Kain has seen him, and of course, Mercator is still wearing his tuxedo and tophat in this village. His appearances are very sparse, though still more substantial than the extremely short appearance in Natsu to Fuyu no Sonata, and he's not very actively involved with solving the mystery, though again, more than in Natsu to Fuyu no Sonata. We also learn via him that there's a very interesting connection between this book and the first Mercator novel, Tsubasa aru Yami ("Darkness with Wings") and people who have read that book thus might want to check this one out too.

When it comes to the actual mystery plot, I'd say the books has some really interesting ideas, some of them very ambitious even, and even though I don't think every element works as good as another or is executed perfectly, I'd still say this was a book worth reading and incredibly fun. After the first murder, other dead bodies pop up, but there is also the matter of a supposed suicide half a year earlier, which happened in a house surrounded by untrodden snow when the body was discovered, meaning a murder would have been impossible as the murderer couldn't have escaped without leaving footprints. The underlying motive behind these murders is a very ambitious one. I love the idea, as it turns a somewhat cliched idea from mystery fiction and turns it completely inside out. It is actually hinted at quite fairly: some of the hints were perhaps even a bit too "in broad daylight" as I kinda started suspecting it'd involve that trope one way or another, but some of the other clues were better hidden, and in hindsight quite clever. I do wish the underlying reason for the motive was explained in more detail as to why it was so important to be like that, but still, I love the audacious idea to use that one trope in such a daring manner. Other parts similarly had both good, and less impressive elements to them. I for example didn't really like the parts involving Abel's involvement in the mystery, though I think there are things done with that, that are executed quite cleverly, and even in a way that ties very impressively back to the greater story. And while Maya's basically also deconstructing classical puzzler mysteries, he usually does rely on Queen-esque set-ups for his stories, so here too we are treated to false solutions with deductions based on physical evidence, the state of the crime scenes and the actions a murderer took, and it works very well with the main idea behind this book. There are certainly parts where I think Maya should have worked some elements out in greater detail, but on the whole, this was very enjoyable. The ending also reminds of the catastrophic climax of Natsu to Fuyu no Sonata, though leaving more room for some catharsis. We basically witness a complete breakdown of both the setting and our main protagonist and like always, Maya leaves you with an undescribable feeling even after "solving" the mystery.

So I really did enjoy Karasu. In a way, it felt to me as a more "traditional mystery" take on themes Maya also tackled in Natsu to Fuyu no Sonata, but I feel infinitely more comfortable recommending Karasu as a mystery novel than that one. The book has fantastic atmosphere and while the execution is not completely perfect, it genuinely has some interesting ideas and tricks to play mystery-wise, so on the whole, I can safely recommend this as a good Maya mystery.

Original Japanese title(s): 麻耶雄嵩『鴉』

Mystery of the Glowing Eye

"His gaze pierces cloud, shadow, earth, and flesh. You know of what I speak, Gandalf: a great Eye, lidless, wreathed in flame."

"The Fellowship of the Ring"

Some years ago, I reviewed the animated film Doraemon: Nobita's Secret Gadget Museum, and I started the post by saying how weird it was I was going to explain what Doraemon was. Doraemon has been so immensely popular for decades not only in Japan, but the whole of South-East Asia, so having to explain what it was, was basically the same as having to explain who Mickey Mouse. In a way, having to explain GeGeGe no Kitarou today feels the same. GeGeGe no Kitarou is a series created by manga legend Mizuki Shigeru and has been very popular since it was created in the late 50s. Or is it the 30s? Originally, the story of Kitarou, a young boy with otherworldly roots who fights supernatural evil, was created in the thirties by Itou Masami and Tatsumi Keiyou as kamishibai, a form of street art where storytellers would use illustrated boards to tell serialized stories while selling candy. After World War II, Mizuki Shigeru, a talented kamishibai illustrator, was asked by the original publisher to continue the series known as Hakaba Kitarou. He would later also create comics-for-rent starring Kitarou of the Graveyard and eventually, Mizuki was given the offer to do a serialized manga series in Shounen Magazine in the late 60s, which came with the new title GeGeGe no Kitarou it is best known as now. 

While there are differences across the various iterations of the series, the core remains the same: Kitarou, born at a graveyard, is the last of the Ghost Tribe and together with his father (who after some hardships in life is now a walking & talking eyeball), the two of them help humans in need whenever they face supernatural danger. With his remendous supernatural powers and the help of other friendly ghouls & ghosts from mainly Japanese mythology, Kitarou faces youkai who prey on helpless humans and want to disturb the balance between the human and supernatural world. The series led to a genuine youkai boom in Japan at the time, reacquainting children with "old" Japanese youkai and mythology. GeGeGe no Kitarou is one of the earliest anime series to be made, but has never been gone from the Japanese pop culture consciousness since: new anime series are created every few years and multiple generations have been brought up with the knowledge Kitarou and his posse have always been there protecting them.

As GeGeGe no Kitarou is of course all about the supernatural adventures Kitarou and his friends have, I honestly never expected I'd be writing about this series here, as the franchise honestly doesn't even aspire to anything even remotely close to a detective.... until late last year. For in November 2023, the animated film Kitarou Tanjou GeGeGe no Nazo ("The Birth of Kitarou ~ The Mystery of GeGeGe") was released to commemorate what would have been Mizuki Shigeru's 100th birthday and it turns out this film is actually.... a detective film. Up to a degree!

Set in 1956, the viewer is first introduced to Mizuki, an employee at the Imperial Blood Bank who desperately wants to climb the corporate ladder. When he learns that Ryuuga Tokisada has passed away, he knows this is his once-in-a-lifetime opportunity: Mizuki is in charge of the account of Ryuuga Medicine and close to Ryuuga Katsunori, the president of Ryuuga Medicine and Tokisada's son-in-law. Mizuki expects Katsunori will become the new patriarch of the Ryuuga clan, controlling the vast fortune of the family, so he decides to travel to the very remote lake village of Nagura to convey his condoleances to the family, but more importantly, to secure himself a comfortable place in Katsunori's pocket. Arriving at the village, Mizuki meets Katsunori's daughter Sayo and her weakly cousin Tokiya, who have never left the village and dream of seeing the great capital Tokyo. Mizuki is allowed to attend the reading of the will, but to everyone's great surprise, it's not Katsunori who inherits everything, but Tokisada's son Tokimaro, a recluse with a few screws loose in his head. The will also stipulates that in the case of Tokimaro's death, Tokiya will inherit everything. The following day, Tokimaro is found brutally murdered, but the mayor and his men soon arrest a wandering stranger, who refuses to say his name, though Mizuki comes to call him Gegerou. The mayor wants to execute Gegerou on the spot, being convinced this stranger is the killer, but Mizuki insists the police should investigate Tokimaro's death properly. Gegerou eventually confides to Mizuki that his wife disappeared many years ago and that he has been looking for her since: sources have revealed to him she was seen in this village before her disappearance. Meanwhile, more people within the Ryuuga clan are killed in horrid manners, but while Mizuki is at first convinced the police must handle these incidents, he soon learns via Gegerou that supernatural powers are at play here, and while Gegerou turns out to be in possession of tremendous spiritual powers himself, solving these murders and the mystery of his missing wife is no easy task...

Let me temper your expectations right away: the finale of this film is not a denouement where Gegerou and Mizuki use logic to solve all the murders: it's all about youkai and other supernatural powers and there are more than a few battles where the combatants all have inhuman powers. This film is not really created as a fair-play mystery film, so don't come in expecting exactly that. That said, I did really enjoy this film, which delves into the story of Kitarou's father before he became a walking eyeball and as a buddy film with Mizuki and Gegerou, Kitarou Tanjou GeGeGe no Nazo is honestly a great watch with a fantastic dark atmosphere. Don't let the poster with Kitarou fool you: while this film is technically tied to the sixth anime series in terms of character designs/voice actors, this film can be surprisingly gory and it's definitely meant for an older audience than the core audience of that series (in fact, it is PG12 in Japan I believe, whereas the series is probably for all ages).

But on the whole, it is clear the production team behind Kitarou Tanjou GeGeGe no Nazo had Yokomizo Seishi in mind and certainly the first half of the film, you could honestly be fooled into thinking you were watching a film based on Yokomizo's work. The remote village is a familiar trope from the Kindaichi Kousuke novels, and the reading of the surprising will in the manor with all the family members all coveting a large share of the pie is very similar to the famous scene from Inugamike no Ichizoku, as well as the unique conditions of the will which seems to spark a series of gruesome murders among the family. The incredibly dark atmosphere, the horrifying underlying motive behind the murders and the whole "something is off about this family and the community" vibe and the sense of how everything slowly seems to crumble as more and more murders are committed, is done splendidly in this film, and I would love to see this team work on an actual Kindaichi anime adaptation, because they absolutely nailed the atmosphere they should be going for. But again, Kitarou Tanjou GeGeGe no Nazo however is not meant to be a fair-play mystery using those elements: it's not like youkai X having this or that power is meant to be a clue about how a certain murder was committed, nor does it expect you to deduce a certain youkai's identity based on the supernatural happenings in the film, so in that sense, it's very different from the other supernatural mysteries I discuss here. But the film's plot structure and main story is taken straight from a mystery story and it's fantastic in its execution of those elements. Guessing who the murderer is, might not be very difficult, but I do love some of the folkloristic clues given in the film, and of course, with talk about youkai and other religious visual imagery going on, at times you're also reminded of the work of Kyougoku Natsuhiko (who has worked on the GeGeGe no Kitarou franchise) and Mitsuda Shinzou, and that's never bad company when it comes to mystery stories involved folklore!

While the murders are the main worry of the people in the Ryuuga clan, Gegerou is of course more interested in the disappearance of his wife, and while this part follows familar mystery tropes less faithfully, I do have to say I really appreciated how this plotline ties back to important themes in Mizuku Shigeru's works, themes that are also partially reflected in the fictional character of Mizuki (who is not meant to be Mizuki Shigeru per se). The film is its own original story by the way, but does take cues from the very first Hakaba no Kitarou story from the rental comics, which tells the story of how Kitarou was born at a graveyard. Because the film features a mostly original story, set before the main GeGeGe no Kitarou series (which doesn't really have a strong chronology anyway), the film can be watched without any prior knowledge of the franchise, I think. The book-ending parts are set in the present with Kitarou, but these parts are short, and other references to the main series in the story set in the past are minor.

I doubt I will ever be writing about GeGeGe no Kitarou on this blog again, but that is also why I decided to discuss Kitarou Tanjou GeGeGe no Nazo this time, because it's just such a unique work within the franchise. I saw the film quite a few months ago, and initially I wasn't planning on writing about it, but after some reflexion, I thought: why not, actually? The film is without a doubt in essence the kind of mystery film I do like to see. It got the atmosphere down perfectly and setting aside the matter of it really being a mystery film or not: As an animated film, it's a visual and auditory delight and the relaxed Gegerou and really stressed out Mizuki work great as reluctant buddies working together. Definitely a must-see for fans of the Kindaichi novels!

Original Japanese title(s): 水木しげる（原作）『鬼太郎誕生 ゲゲゲの謎』

Minute for Murder

“Nonsense. You can’t order life mathematically,” retorted the Judge.  

"The Spanish Cape Mystery"

Still weird how the author Hikawa just... disappeared...

After a succesful party with employees of a computer company and the game company Joyit, they decide to have another one at Joyit's offices. Saeko, who was a great success at the previous party, goes again, bringing along her friend Shiori. They arrive early at Joyit, and are led to an office room where they can wait for the party to start: due to unforeseen circumstances in the program they are working on at Joyit, there's a bit of a delay, as the programmers and managers who are scheduled to go to the party too have to scramble and quickly fix the program. People walk in and out the office while waiting for the party to start, chatting in the hallways, and with some people using this opportunity to talk with people private. But when the party is about to start and everyone heads back to the office, they find the sales manager Senzoku alone in the office, sitting dead in a chair having been strangled. The police start to investigate the murder, but Shiori quickly realizes this is a kind of locked room. From the office where Sensoku was killed, there were three routes via which the killer could've escaped between the murder and the discovery of the body: going right from the office, or left and another left for the emergency exit, or left and then a right to go to the normal staircase. These three routes however where all observed, as people had been chatting at those spots before the body was discovered. Recognizing this puzzle, Shiori and Saeko decide to present this problem to their friend Hikawa Tooru, an aspiring mystery author, who too admits this is not a "real" locked room mystery, but a "rhetorical" one as the escape routes were all blocked, and he takes on the puzzle in Hikawa Tooru's Misshitsu Logic, also known as The Rhetorical Locked Room (2003).

Misshitsu Logic is the last novel in Hikawa Tooru's five-part series about the same-named Hikawa Tooru, an aspiring mystery author who after five books still hasn't quite managed to make his professional debut. The actual novelist Hikawa Tooru stopped publishing books after 2003, and has basically vanished, so I guess that ended the fictional Hikawa Tooru's career too! I've been reading these books the last few months, because they were touted as Ellery Queen-inspired books, which they certainly are, but while they shared a focus on both physical evidence and the actions of people, based on what they knew/could have known at what time, and longer deduction chains, these books never really quite managed to capture the spirit as well as other Queen-inspired authors like Arisugawa's Egami novels or Tsukatou Hajime's Nationality novels with Mikikaze. 

Misshitsu Logic is a rather strange novel though, as it's extremely short. It's basically a novella, even though the price of the book was certainly not lower than you'd normally expect. What's more, this book, more than ever, feels likely barely more than a logic puzzle, as the title suggest. It barely feels like a work of "fiction" in the literary sense. The book consists of three parts, with the longest part being the first part, which basically sets the scene for the puzzle: we follow different characters in the two hours leading up to the discovery of the murder, with people chatting with each other, walking in and out of the office and of course, with time stamps. The second part focuses on the investigation, showing how the murder was practically impossible because the escape routes were all under observation by people standing in the hallways, but basically adds no new information beyond what we learned in part 1. Part 3 is obviously Hikawa explaining who the murderer is, and when you're done, you've barely read 160 pages (to put in context: the previous novels were all at least 250 pages, and closer to 350 pages). 

So most of the meat of the book is found in Part 1, but this really reads a logic puzzle. It's so... devoid of energy, just swapping between perspectives with time stamps and everything as everyone moves around. Previous books did the same, mind you, but at least continued this after the discovery of the murder too. But because this book is so short and the bulk of the pages is devoted just to the lead-up to the discovery of the murder, it just feels like a logic puzzle, and nothing more. I also had real trouble getting into the minds of all the different characters, partially due to the weird set-up. Why do they have a inter-company party... with just like 10 people... at the offices of one of the companies? Why not just somewhere in a restaurant or bar? Why does the "company party" read more like a mixer party, with some of the men obviously just here to ogle the women? Why are the people joining this party from completely different sections of each company? Why is Saeko basically the only one from the computer company? While not really a big deal, I just got distracted constantly by the weird company party this was supposed to be, and I kept wondering why it couldn't just have been any other occassion, set at Saeko's own company, rather than it being about a inter-company party.

So ultimately, you just have a logic puzzle about what route the murderer could've taken after the killing, and why they went unnoticed. As expected of Hikawa, the focus of the chain of deductions is very Queen-esque, zooming in on the various people standing at the chokepoints and examining in a logical manner whether for example they would've been lying about not seeing the murderer leave or not, and things like that. He does this in a meticulous manner, checking the various witnesses (suspects) one by one and explaining how their observed actions would prove whether they did lie or not, but it all feels too sterile in this book. The meat-to-mystery ratio is too lean, leading to something that isn't fun as a book to read. There's not really a brilliant "gotcha" moment, something that turns the chain of reasoning around or provides a brilliantly new angle to the puzzle. It's very business-like, and while there's one moment that's kinda presented as a clever piece of insight on Hikawa's part to allow him to push the chain of deduction forward, it falls flat, as the build-up is chaotic and not fun for the reader at all. I guess the 'cleverest' part was the final step, which allowed to Hikawa strike away the last of the innocent suspects and end up with the identity of the guilty murderer, but even than it was something that was just.. okay, and not something worth recommending this book for.

Misshitsu Logic may be the last Hikawa Tooru novel starring the same-named detective, it is also by far the worst one. It is extremely short, basically a novella, but even then it's far too sterile, with the book barely feeling like anything more than a logic puzzle, only told in a slightly longer manner, while not being enjoyable to read as a prose story. Even as a Queen fan, this is too dry, with a set-up that is just people walking in and out of rooms, and then just a dry: okay, now solve this puzzle! The deduction chain, while meticulously set-up, lacks a really impressive moment, resulting in a book you'll just shrug at. A sad way to end a series, but that's the way things go.

Original Japanese title(s): 氷川透『密室ロジック』

A Figure in Hiding

It seemed to be a sort of monster, or symbol representing a monster, of a form which only a diseased fancy could conceive. If I say that my somewhat extravagant imagination yielded simultaneous pictures of an octopus, a dragon, and a human caricature, I shall not be unfaithful to the spirit of the thing. A pulpy, tentacled head surmounted a grotesque and scaly body with rudimentary wings; but it was the general outline of the whole which made it most shockingly frightful. Behind the figure was a vague suggestion of a Cyclopean architectural background.

"The Call of Cthulhu"

I'm still bummed I have the first few books in this series with their original pocket covers, as the current covers with Arai Keiichi's art are much more alluring!

Disclosure: I translated Higashigawa Tokuya's Lending the Key to the Locked Room, the first book in same series as the book discussed today.

Ikagawa City series:
Lending the Key to the Locked Room
Misshitsu ni Mukatte Ute ("Shoot Towards The Locked Room")
Kanzen Hanzai ni wa Neko Nanbiki Hitsuyouka ("How Many Cats Do You Need For a Perfect Crime?")
Koukan Satsujin ni Mukanai Yoru ("A Bad Night to Exchange Murders")
Koko ni Shitai wo Sutenaide Kudasai! ("Don't Dump Your Bodies Here Please!")

Squid-sou no Satsujin ("The Squid House Murders")

 

Short Story Collections

Tantei Sae Inakereba ("If Only That Detective Hadn't Been There...")

Adaptations
Watashi no Kirai na Tantei ("The Detective I Don't Like")

Two years ago, I reviewed Squid-sou no Satsujin ("The Squid House Murders"), which was the most recent entry in Higashiwa Tokuya's Ikagawa City series. At the end of the review, I noted that while I was at that point up to date with all the novels, I hadn't read the three short story collections yet. A minor trouble I had was that while I hadn't read the books, I did already know about more than half of the stories found in the first two collections due to them being adapted for the live action drama or having read the story in an anthology before. So I was not really in a hurry to read these books. But that did mean I still had the third collection to read, and that is of course the topic of today's post. Tantei Sae Inakereba ("If Only That Detective Hadn't Been There...", 2017) has a suggestive title, and indeed, the stories found in this book are mostly inverted mystery stories, which is... in hindsight not as surprising as I had initially though. While the novels aren't really inverted mysteries, you had some stories like Koko ni Shitai wo Sutenaide Kudasai! ("Don't Dump Your Bodies Here Please!" 2009) that have multiple narratives, and one of them being about two people who have to get rid of a dead body (and no, this is not even the main mystery!). In fact, the series always features multiple narratives, most often following the adventures of private detective Ukai and his assistant Ryuuhei, and a duo of police detectives simultaneously, with a lot of the mystery being structured around how these narratives intertwine. So in a way, having stories seen from the POV of the murderer isn't that odd for this series. The book is very short though, as are the stories, so I can already start with the conclusion that this is a funny book to read, but it's unlikely to actually "fill" your stomach if you're hungry for mystery. Most of the stories have interesting ideas, but often work towards what could be considered a punchline, and it's more the kind of book you want to read between more "serious" mystery.

Kuramochi Kazuya no Futatsu no Alibi ("The Two Alibis of Kuramochi Kazuya") is a pure inverted story, following the attempt of Kuramochi Kazuya of succesfully killing his wife's uncle and get away with it. His wife's uncle is a wealthy man who owns a restaraunt which is now run by Kuramochi, but business has not been great, and his uncle now refuses to pump more money in the restaurant. So the solution is of course to kill the man and inherit his money through his wife. The plan is to create a perfect alibi: he has invited the private detective Ukai, saying he wants to hire Ukai to find his lost pet. During their talk, Kuramochi excuses himself for a moment to use the bathroom, but in fact he drowns his uncle, whom he had rendered unconscious beforehand, in river water he brought home, so when he will later dump the body in the river, the police will determine his uncle actually died by drowning in the river, at a time Kuramochi was talking with Ukai. Of course, things go wrong, but why? The mistake he makes is incredibly cliche'd, but it actually works here, because the set-up for why Kuramochi fell for it was done really well: as always, it was hidden in the funnier parts of the narrative, and you'd never know that running joke was actually a set-up for the solution. Definitely a "punchline" type of solution, but one I liked.

Ukai and his landlord Akemi are visiting the local multi-day festival at the Ika River River Side Park, and the big finale is a competition between mascotte figures. One of the people they run into at the festival is Sayaka, a girl they met during a previous adventure, and who is most definitely not also the squid mascotte figure Kenzaki Maika, for Maika is of course really a cute character and they are not humans pretending to be mascotte figures. In the dressing tent, they also find others like Pufferfish Harry, the turtle Kamekichi and the masu salmon Yamame-chan, who are all getting prepped for the contest. Harry goes having a smoke in a seperate section of the tent, when after a while, Kamekichi, who had also been smoking, suddenly cries out. When they all go the smoking section, they find Harry lying on the floor, bleeding, and they find the person inside had been stabbed through his suit. Given that there had been only one other mascotte in the smoking section, it seems obvious who stabbed Harry, but is the answer really so simple? I am not that big a fan of this story: I do like the concept of how Harry was stabbed under seemingly impossible circumstances, but it seems a bit too little to carry a whole story, it would have worked better as a supporting concept, rather the main, as it is a bit too straightforward and I think it also works better in a visual medium.

Doctor Akihabara is a self-proclaimed genius in Hakase to Robot no Fuzai Shoumei ("The Alibis of the Doctor and his Robot") who has finally succeeded in creating a bi-pedal, talking robot after years of experiments (and yes.... he's a bit late...), but he owes his sponsor a lot of money, so the easy way out is to kill the man, and he realizes he can use his robot to create a fake alibi! Both he and his sponsor have a second villa in the mountains, and the plan is to kill the man, have his robot pretend to be the man while the doctor himself visits the neighbors, making sure they see his robot pretending to be the victim moving about in front of the windows, moving the estimated time of his death to the period while the doctor was having dinner with his neighbors. Akemi also happens to be visiting those neighbors, and while the doctor is quite smitten by her, he does not forget to make sure they all see "the neighbor" walking up and down in front of the window in a programmed routine. The next day, the corpse is found, but the weather conditions make it clear the murderer is likely someone staying on the mountains now, and there are only a handful of them in this season. I think this was the best story overall of the volume: there is funny banter between the doctor and his talking robot as they work together to kill their target and set-up the ruse, but the mistake the doctor makes is thematically brilliant and I really didn't see it coming. I'm trying to imagine it being used in a more serious story, but I don't think it would have been even half as effective as it's done here, as it adds a wonderfully ironic tone to the story. It's still a very simple, 'one-trick-pony'-esque inverted mystery as most of the others, but very satisfying considering its length.

To Aru Misshtisu no Hajimari to Owari ("The Beginning and the Ending of a Locked Room") has Ukai and Ryuuhei working on a case for a mother: she suspects her daughter-in-law is cheating, and has hired the two detectives to find evidence. They find out who the partner is and have the evidence, and the mother wants to confront her son with the evidence, and Ukai and Ryuuhei come along. They find the house locked, which is odd, as the son should've been alone in the house while his wife was visiting her own parents. Fearing something is off, they break in the house and find it empty. At least, they think so, until they enter the bathroom, and in the tub, they find a chopped up body, with the head of the son floating in the tub! But if the house was locked from the inside, where did the murderer go to? The story starts in media res, allowing for some tension, but the solution to the locked room is almost hilarious silly. Like the other stories, it's really just a punchline, but it works because it's not treated too seriously, and it is a neat subversion: you'll see the same trick used in a serious way far more often, but I didn't immediately recognize it because it is used in such a silly, non-practical manner now, so it kinda slips beneath the radar. Again one of those ideas that work because it's done in such a light-hearted manner in a very short story.

Higaisha to Yoku Nita Otoko ("The Man Who Greatly Resembles the Victim") follows the story of Kitayama Masato. Masato is the illegitimate son of Anekouji Kenzou, the former head of the wealthy Anekouji clan which runs Anekouji Products. But while his older brother Anekouji Kazuhito became the new head of the company, Masato was never recognized officially and is now living from one part-time job to another. One night, he is approached by a beautiful woman, who confides to him she plans to kill Kazuhito, as he had dumped a dear friend of hers who committed suicide because of it. It turns out Kazuhito and Masato, while they have not met in years, actually resemble each other a lot. The woman's plan is to use Masato to create an alibi for her: Masato is to pretend to be Kazuhito by visiting a cafe Kazuhito frequents and have some drinks there, while she'll kill Kazuhito, thus making it seem like Kazuhito died much later than he actually did. Kazuhito finally agrees to the plan, and both do everything according as discussed, but the police still manages to figure out how they did it. But why? The story has a very interesting twist before the true end, that changes your views on the murder scheme slightly, but it is fairly minor, as two pages later, you'll already arrive at the true solution. Which is a bit predictable, once the jokes about a certain trait of Masato are introduced in the story. Not a bad story per se, but perhaps the "lightest" of the five stories, and they are all very light in content matter in the first place.

I already mentioned it earlier, but Tantei Sae Inakereba is on the whole a funny collection, but it's very short and light-hearted, and not likely to really satisfy you if you're looking for memorable detective stories. But as something you can read very quickly between heftier volumes, it's alright. I doubt this volume alone will convince anyone to seek out all the Ikagawa City books, especially as you don't see as much of the series characters in these stories due to the inverted format of most of the stories, but having read all of the novels, I did enjoy this brief return to the odd city. Now to see when I will tackle the other two collections...

Original Japanese title(s) 東川篤哉『探偵さえいなければ』: 「倉持和哉の二つのアリバイ」/「ゆるキャラはなぜ殺される」/「博士とロボットの不在証明」/『とある密室の始まりと終わり」/「被害者とよく似た男」

The Corpse Danced at Midnight

"What a good night for a murder, eh? I mean, if somebody wanted to kill anybody, nobody would know if it was a gunshot or a firework."

"Agatha Christie's Poirot: Murder in the Mews"

This reminds me, I really should check whether I can get a new capacitor for my kinetic-driven watch...

Also: I haven't mentioned the Honkaku Discord in the weekly posts for some time now, but errr.... there's a Honkaku Discord server! It's a pretty easy-going server where we talk about mystery fiction (not exclusively Japanese), do book clubs and things like that, so if that sounds like fun, come have a look: https://discord.gg/z3HMSmf8qd

It's been almost two and a half years since I last discussed The Clockmaker Detective series by Ooyama Seiichirou, a series also known as Alibi Kuzushi Uketamawarimasu ("Alibi Cracking, At Your Service"), which is the title of the books, as well as of the live action drama series. The temporary absence from the blog doesn't mean Ooyama hasn't been working on this series though. Two short story collections have already been released, but earlier this year, the third "season" of this series started officially with the publication of the story Tokeiya Tantei to Shinnen no Alibi ("The Clockmaker Detective and A New Year's Alibi"), which can be read for free at the J Novel site of the publisher. The story starts in the usual manner: the narrator, who is still called a rookie by his fellow police detectives even though he's been in the team for over a year now, visits Mitani Clockmakers, a quaint shop run by Mitani Tokino, a young woman who inherited the shop from her grandfather. As per her grandfather's instructions, she also offers an alibi cracking service, because it is "time-related" and therefore should be part of a clockmaker's work. Tokino has been helping the narrator immensely in his investigations, and this time, he has another problem. After exchanging new year's greetings, the narrator explains the conundrum the police are facing now.

On New Year's Eve, just after midnight, a man was found shot to death on the street. As the man still had his wallet, the victim's identity is soon determined: Noto Shingo is better known as the manga artist NOT, who has a hit manga with Hi no Kuni ("The Land of Not"). It doesn't seem he has any enemies, but one fact does attract the police's attention: the crime scene was close to Shijou-ji, a temple Noto always visited at midnight on New Year's Eve, right after midnight. It turns out an old friend of Noto lives near the temple: Itsu Kouhei, also known as Itsutsuboshi, is the manga artist of Bouzu Deka ("Monk Cop"), and the two have known each other from when they were both still struggling artists. In the past, Noto would go visit Itsu on New Year's Eve and go to Shihou-ji together, though with both of them being busy with their respective hits, they hardly see each other anymore. Still, the police suspects Noto might have intended to go to Shihou-ji with Itsu, and that Itsu might have killed Noto then, so they pay him a visit and of course ask about his alibi for New Year's Eve. Itsu however has a perfect alibi: he had been working hard on the last day of the year because of a deadline, and his assistant was with him the whole day and evening. They worked until the afternoon, fell asleep until the early evening of the thirty-first. They then watched Kouhaku Uta-gassen together as per tradition in many Japanese households on New Year's Eve. When it became midnight, Noto invited his assistant out into the garden to take a breather, where they heard people crying out "Happy New Year" and the bell starting to ring at Shihou-ji: as at many temples, the bell is struck 108 times to drive away earthly desires, and at Shijou-ji, they start exactly at midnight. After that, Itsu also read some manga drafts of his assistant and gave him some pointers, so Itsu thus has a perfect alibi for the time of the murder. Yet, the narrator feels the alibi might have been falsified, but all his own attempts at breaking it seem to fail. Can Tokino solve this mystery?

Well, of course she can. She wouldn't be much of a clockmaker if she couldn't!

After two relatively stories Tokeiya Tantei to Niritsu Haihan no Alibi ("The Clockmaker Detective and the Antinomic Alibi") and Tokeiya Tantei to Ichizoku no Alibi ("The Clockmaker Detective and a Family's Alibi"), we have a relatively "simple" story this time in terms of structure. What is interesting though, is how Itsu's alibi seems to vouched for by two elements that seem completely out of his control: the assistant was watching Kouhaku Uta-Gassen, which is a live television program which also counts down to midnight, and he heard the striking of bell of Shihou-ji Temple, which again is an element that "proves" what time it is, and not only to the assistant alone, but to everyone else who were watching Kouhaku Uta-Gassen or heard the bell ringing: in a way the assistant (and Itsu) gained their alibi by being a participant in a "group event", and that is a lot harder to falsify than a clock in a room or something like that. I do have to admit that the solution feels a bit underwhelming after the previous two stories, which were much trickier, but I guess this works perfectly as an opening story for a third volume, as the two "communal" proofs for Itsu's alibi do really seem very strong at first sight.

Some elements regarding Itsu's trick are explained in a rather handwavey manner ("Oh, he probably did this...") and feel a bit cheap, but I do really, really like the clue that points to the biggest trick Itsu pulled: while I had guessed what it was beforehand, I actually didn't realize how that clue actually tied back to the solution, and I think that clue was really clever, and perfect in case you hadn't made a guess yet. I'm almost more a fan of mystery fiction that provides clear clue-trails, rather than expecting the reader to make some wild guess based on instinct, so I could appreciate that element. It is also nice to see the narrator is actually starting to get a hang for alibi cracking himself too, as he and his co-workers are clearly are getting the hang of it and starting to think a bit like Tokino, coming up with pretty good theories for how the culprit could've created a fake alibi. 

All in all, a not very surprising, but still consistent opening story to what will hopefully become another solid volume with stories with original perfect alibi stories! I will probably discuss the following stories too in the future as they release (probably not five months late the next time), so let's hope the next one will come soon!

Original Japanese title(s): 大山誠一郎「時計屋探偵と新年のアリバイ」

Obituary for a Dead Anchor

If you have never been at sea in a heavy gale, you can form no idea of the confusion of mind occasioned by the wind and spray together. They blind, deafen, and strangle you, and take away all power of action or reflection. 

"A Descent into the Maelström"

I honestly don't like writing posts about books I didn't really like. Which is also the reason why reviews on my blog tend to be relatively positive: if I really didn't like something, I probably didn't finish it, or I didn't want to spend more time on it by also writing a post.

The S.S. Meganaut is en route from New York to Cherbourg. Every night, an auction is held in the smoking room, when guests can bid on numbers, which correspond to the number of nautical niles they think the ship will be able to traverse the coming day (so, it's gambling). One of the passengers on board is the wealthy Victor Timothy Smith, accompanied by his daughter Coralie. He and his entourage seem to have quite some fun bidding against, and winning from the lawyer Saul de Brasto, who has not been able to even buy one number because Smith constantly uses his immense fortune to outbid de Brasto. The lights in the smoking room suddenly go out however, followed by a pistol shot. When the lights go back on again, Smith is lying dead on the floor, daughter Coralie has passed out and Saul de Brasto is holding a smoking gun in his hand. Not surprisingly, de Brasto is immediately detained by the ship detectives for the murder on Smith, but he denies having shot Smith, claiming he shot his pistol at someone else in the room, a hitman who was trying to shoot him! However, an examination of the crime scene soon proves de Brasto right: Smith was shot by two bullets one after another, while de Brasto only shot once, and his bullet is found buried in a table in the other direction than where Smith was. The detectives are baffled as to who the murderer then is, especially as the case becomes even grimmer with Coralie dying from the sheer shock of what occured, but it happens four psychologists on their way to London develop an interest in the case too, and they each think they can explain who the murderer really is in C. Daly King's Obelists at Sea (1932).

A few years ago, I read King's Obelists Fly High, a book that was certainly not perfect, but which I did think was a fun read due to some interesting points, most notably the Clue-Finder: an appendix at the very end of the book, a list of all the hints complete with page and line reference, sorted by category (clues to how, who, motive etc.). It was a very daring way to prove to the reader the game was being played in a fair manner, and I had always wanted to read the other Obelists books too, to see whether the other books could perhaps improve on the points I did find less impressive about Fly High.

Obelists at Sea is not that book. Oh well, there's always En Route...

Obelists at Sea is a book that has many of the same elements of Fly High, elements that can provide for an interesting mystery story. We have the murder happening in a closed circle situation (a luxury liner), a story built around multiple solutions, as provided by the four psychologists, a mystery surrounding someone being able to shoot twice at Smith in the dark and of course the promise of a Clue-Finder, a multi-page proof to show King has indeed provided enough clues for you to solve the murder. The book even features multiple very detailed floorplans of the S.S. Meganaut. Memorable are the punny names of most of the characters (Victim = Victor Timothy) too.

But all of this goes nowhere good. The floorplans for example? Basically just there for fluff, because they don't actually serve any role mystery-wise. There's plenty of interesting moments and points of mystery throughout the novel, like a corpse disappearing from the doctor's quarters and the mystery of the two bullets in the victim, but the actual solutions for these events are basically shrugged over, quickly explained in like two or three sentences without giving those moments any weight. The book focuses much, muuuuch more on the idea of having four different psychologists, who each champion a different school, offer different theories for the murder (of course all pointing at different people, based on different evidence). Of course, we have seen other books utilize such structures too, from The Poisoned Chocolates Case, which too has multiple detectives proposing different theories, similar to a lot of Brand's work, but also something like Ellery Queen, where sometimes you'll see Ellery himself proposing multiple solutions. But Obelists At Sea doesn't work for me, because the theories are all so based on pscyhology (King was a psychologist), I just can't take them really seriously in a mystery novel. In a way, I do get King attempted to portray psychology from a slightly ironic angle, making fun of the four psychologists (who are basically caricatures, embodiments of their respective schools) and their theories that aren't really based on anything but "X has shown indications they are of a certain character type, so they would have done Y", but this gets tiring very fast, especically as the majority of the book is written around this gimmick. The theories presented here feel like they would be spouted by a random character and immediately brushed off in a Queen-style, evidence-and-logic-based mystery novel, not the types you can structure a whole novel around. What doesn't help either is that while the book kinda wants to say "see, psychology doesn't work" by showing these psychologists arriving at very different solutions simply because they adhere to different schools, the final solution and the clues found in the Clue-Finder are still mostly built around psychological clues! So I don't really get what King was going for. The final solution does have elements I like for a final solution (the whodunnit etc.), but by that time, I didn't really care anymore, and I think the route towards this solution could've been so much more interesting and satisfying.

The book also has a rather noticable anti-semetic tone throughout. The book never, ever forgets to remind you the main suspect Saul de Brasto is a Jew. The book starting with Victor Smith harrassing de Brasto by outbidding him every time can still be seen as a form of anti-semitism commited by one character alone, but even after he's dead, everyone from the ship's detectives to the captain keep referring to de Brasto as the Jew or the Hebrew (note that no other character in the book is referred to constantly by their background), which isn't helped when they also learn he's a lawyer, because of course he'd be a crooked lawyer (because he's a....). Even after the initial supsicion on de Brasto should be cleared, the man is treated as as if they had preferred to have jailed him anyway. It gets very tiring very quickly.

Obelists At Sea just didn't do it for me. While on the surface, it has elements that seemed promising, or at least, elements that I have seen used in plenty of mystery novels that were fun, beneath the water level, it just ended up as a book I didn't enjoy. The main structure just doesn't work for me because I am not interested in solutions based solely on psychological analyses of characters, the more interesting elements mystery-wise for some reason are underplayed because of that and the Clue-Finder gimmick is still focused on psychological clues, something I had hoped it would have done differently from Obelists Fly High. I bought a Japanese translation of Obelists En Route (translated by Ayukawa Tetsuya!) a while back, so I'll probably get to that eventually!