番外編： A Smart Dummy in the Tent

So for the last two months or so, I kept telling myself, don't forget to write an announcement, it'll take no time at all, it'll just be a short post.... And in the end, I still didn't manage to write this thing in time...

Last year, Locked Room International released the hilarious impossible crime mystery The 8 Mansion Murders by Takemaru ABIKO, translated by yours truly. That was not the first time Abiko had been translated to English, as some of his work for videogames (like The Starship Damrey (3DS)) had already been available in the West, but The 8 Mansion Murders was his first proper mystery novel which had been translated into English. I was obviously happy to see that the novel was received pretty well when it released (if you haven't read it yet, please do). For those who enjoyed the novel, I have good news, as more Abiko is available now. The June/August 2019 issue of Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine (which should be available right now) features Abiko's impossible crime short story A Smart Dummy In The Tent (orig.: 1990), once again translated by me. The story is part of Abiko's Mario series, and stars a... ventriloquist's dummy as the detective. Yoshio is an incredibly gifted, but somewhat clumsy ventriloquist who performs together with his puppet Mario. However, Yoshio's great secret is that Mario isn't just a tool of his trade, Mario's a whole seperate personality of Yoshio. And despite his arrogant and wise-cracking personality, Mario's also actually really clever and sharp, which comes in handy in A Smart Dummy In The Tent, when Yoshio and his love interest Mutsuki get involved with an impossible crime that occurs in the backstage area of a circus tent.

Those who enjoyed the comedy and banter of The 8 Mansion Murders should really check out the story, as this one too is immensely fun to read, while the impossible crime angle of the story is also quite original, really fitting to the circus setting. I hope you'll enjoy the read! To end with a completely uninteresting note: I have been to the circus in real life only once, when I was a kid!

As for other projects and related announcements, that's a tale for another day. Another day that might not really ask for a DeLorean, but some patience will be necessary.

Long Shot

一射入魂

(四字熟語）

One's whole soul into one shot

(Japanese idiom)

Disclosure: I translated Abiko Takemaru's The 8 Mansion Murders. Also: the cover of today's book is amazing (the angle!).

Shinozaki Rin is a high school student who has been practicing the art of kyudo, or Japanese archery, since junior high. She's quite good at the martial art too, but as of late, she feels she might've hit a ceiling in her development cycle. While she trains several times a week in the school's archery club together with the other club members, she has also arranged she can visit the home of the retired teacher Tanahashi for some extra training. Tanahashi, who is an excellent archer herself and who used to be in charge of the school club, has a small private archery dojo built inside her own garden, and while she does not coach Rin anymore, she has allowed Rin to make use of the dojo for an hour or so in the weekend. One day however, Rin arrives at her old teacher's home only to find her path blocked by the police. A man was found dead with an arrow in his chest inside Tanahashi's archery dojo, and it is suspected that Rin's old teacher accidently shot the man when he walked into the dojo from the back door. Rin's knowledge of all the customs of Japanese archery allows her to poke a hole in the police's story and point the finger in the direction of the real murderer, and Rin unwittingly becomes famous a her school as the attractive prodigy archer detective. To Rin however, that's just more noise in her head as she tries to become better at archery in Abiko Takemaru's short story collection Rin no Tsurune ("The Sound of Rin's Bowstring", 2018).

I definitely have a weakness for mystery stories that involve specific fields or professions, and of course utilize those fields to come up with unique mystery plots. Come to think of it, I haven't read many stories that really utilize specific sports in the plot, save for the semi-frequent ones in Detective Conan (which can be both fun and educational). Anyway, I certainly knew very little about kyudo/Japanese archery and I can't think of any mystery story that's really built on that theme, so in any case, Rin no Tsurune wins points with its original subject matter. The specifics of kyudo are explained pretty well in this novel, emphasizing the fact that kyudo isn't 'just about shooting an arrow in the target', but also a highly ceremonial martial art where the spiritual/meditative aspect of the sport is at least as important as being able to aim and shoot.

Rin no Tsurune is both a mystery story and a YA novel, and perhaps it's best mentioned right away that while the book starts off with a fairly strong mystery vibe, this becomes less and less as you progress in the book. The first few stories feature some "classic" mystery situations that involve archery: the first story is about the murder at Tanahashi's home, but there's also a story for example about an expensive bamboo bow which has disappeared from the school dojo even though everyone was there training and the exit was being watched. The solutions to all these "conventional" mysteries involve specifics to kyudo, but it's a shame Abiko's not always playing fair: some deductions are based on facts about kyudo or the circumstances which aren't disclosed to the reader in advance, but only when Rin explains what has happened. So it's unlikely the reader, even if they had the knowledge about Japanese archery, would be able to completely solve these cases, and most of the time, you'll just go "Alright, that makes sense given the information you have just given me but not before". The way Rin deduces in the first story why it's at least unlikely the victim was shot by accident makes absolute sense for example in a logical way, but you'll never be able to guess it if you don't have knowledge about Japanese archery, and even then it's not really solvable, as the physical clue on which the deduction is based isn't explicitly mentioned until Rin does in her explanation.

After the first three stories or so however, the emphasis of the book definitely shifts towards the more conventional young adult novel, with some minor everyday life mysteries. Rin learns how other people see kyudo, she has her own teenager problems with what to do in the future and how she'll give kyodo in place in her life, and we also have semi-funny parts with Nakata of the school's newspaper club, who wants to make a movie about the "prodigy archer detective" Rin and the beautiful captain of the archery club Yuko (semi-funny, I say, because he's basically just stalking two girls with a camera). At this point however, the "mysteries" presented are hardly anything solvable to the reader however, and are more related to the psychology and motivation of the characters ("Why did they do that?"-type of mysteries). Some might enjoy this better than I did, but I was rather disappointed the "classic" type of mysteries were completely gone in this second half of the book.

As a YA sports novel, Rin no Tsurune can definitely entertain though. We follow Rin in her year as she slowly learns more about the sport she already thought she knew, and we see how all the characters all see kyudo in a different manner and want something else from the sport. We even have a tournament, because every sports story needs that!

Rin no Tsurune can perhaps better be described as a YA sports novel, that also has a few episodes featuring a mystery plot, than a mystery story with a sports element in it. I myself would've preferred the latter to be the case to be completely honest, but I did find the book entertaining as a sport comedy-type of story, especially as I knew next to nothing about kyudo before. But yeah, it's not as focused a mystery novel as you would first hope or expect and I wouldn't recommend this one if you're specifically looking for a puzzle plot mystery about Japanese archery.

Original Japanese title(s): 我孫子武丸『凛の弦音』

番外編：The 8 Mansion Murders Released

I really should stop doing announcements of upcoming announcements, because it always leaves me with next to nothing to say with the actual announcement...

So yeah, I have little to add to my previous post, but to say that Takemaru ABIKO's The 8 Mansion Murders (original Japanese title: 8 no Satsujin) is now finally available as both a trade paperback and e-book, translated by me and published by Locked Room International. The previous shin honkaku mystery novels brought by LRI were obviously inspired by Agatha Christie (The Decagon House Murders) and Ellery Queen (The Moai Island Puzzle), while also having their own, distinct voice: The 8 Mansion Murders continues that trend of building on the context of Golden Age mystery fiction, but within a modern, setting as the impossible murders committed with a crossbow within a curious 8-shaped house invoke clearly the spirit of John Dickson Carr, which is even emphasized with a genuine Locked Room Lecture. The 8 Mansion Murders is also by far the funniest novel I've translated until now, but don't let the comedy fool ya! Publishers Weekly said in its starrred review the book is "one of the funniest and cleverest novels of its type to hit the English-language market in years."

ABIKO was the third author to debut from the Kyoto University Mystery Club, after Yukito AYATSUJI (The Decagon House Murders) and Rintaro NORIZUKI ('The Lure of the Green Door') (ARISUGAWA Alice was also a student in Kyoto, but he was at Doshisha University). ABIKO's career in the mystery genre expands beyond novels, as he was also the mastermind behind the epoch-making Kamaitachi no Yoru videogame for the Super Famicom in the mid-90s, changing the form of mystery games (an English-language localized version titled Banshee's Last Cry is available on iOS/Android). The Starship Damrey (3DS) and 428 - Shibuya Scramble (first English release in 2018) are some other games he worked on that are available in English, but The 8 Mansion Murders will be the first time one of his novels is published in English translation.

For those who have read LRI's earlier releases of (shin) honkaku mystery novels: you probably know what you can expect, so why wait? For those who haven't yet: I actually think this is the most accessible one until now. Like with the other novels, there are a lot of references to classic mystery fiction, but the banter of the characters in The 8 Mansion Murders is really funny to read and the main impossible mysteries are a blast.

And that's it for today's service announcement. I hope you'll enjoy The 8 Mansion Murders!

番外編：The 8 Mansion Murders

It's that time of the year again! Hay fever? Well, yes, that too, but the last few years, the early spring has also been the period for me to do a service announcement that should interest those who like Japanese mystery fiction.

In 2015, I was more than excited to announce that Locked Room International would publish Yukito AYATSUJI's The Decagon House Murders, and that I was responsible for the translation of that ingenious homage to Agatha Christie's And Then There Were None. The year after, we followed up with Alice ARISUGAWA's The Moai Island Puzzle, a mystery novel I personally see as one of the greatest Japanese experiments in deduction, beating Ellery Queen at his own game. Both these novels were excellent examples of the shin honkaku, or new orthodox mystery novel movement that started in the second half of the eighties in Japan, when a group of young university students started making their debuts as professional writers with puzzle plot mysteries that harkened back on the Golden Age, but with an imbedded meta-concious tone. In 2017, I worked on The Ginza Ghost, a short story collection of (mostly) impossible mysteries from the 1930s-1940s by Keikichi OSAKA, a brilliant master of the short story who sadly enough became a forgotten writer after World War II, but who has recently regained a very appreciative audience.

For 2018, we're going back to shin honkaku, back to modern puzzle plot mysteries that pay homage to Golden Age mystery fiction, but also build upon that and even dare to go further. By now it's known that the shin honkaku movement was born in Kyoto, as most of the shin honkaku writers originated from Mystery Clubs from universities in the ancient capital of Japan. The most influential was the Kyoto University Mystery Club, where writers like Ayatsuji and Norizuki came from (Arisugawa came from Doshisha University's MC). For Locked Room International's third shin honkaku novel, we have the first novel of the third author who debuted from Kyoto University Mystery Club. Takemaru ABIKO's The 8 Mansion Murders was originally released in 1989, but the English version is scheduled to be released coming May. The novel's a tribute to the impossible crime mystery in the spirit of John Dickson Carr, which also happens to be a hilarious adventure. Comedy is a trademark of Abiko, but don't let the funny bickering between the various characters fool you, as the core is as classic as you can get, with impossible murders inside an odd, "8"-shaped house and! and a genuine locked room lecture!

Publishers Weekly has an early starrred review up and deemed The 8 Mansion Murders "one of the funniest and cleverest novels of its type to hit the English-language market in years." My own review from many years ago can be found here. Of the novels I've done for Locked Room International now, I think The 8 Mansion Murders is not only by far the funniest, it's also the most accessible I think, with a more classic, but certainly not less entertaining set-up.

Takemaru ABIKO writes mystery plots for a wide variety of mediums, and has especially been influential in the videogame world. The game Kamaitachi no Yoru was a genuine game-changer for mystery games back in the mid-90s (the first where you had to input the name of the culprit yourself!), and an English localized version is available on iOS and Android under the name Banshee's Last Cry. He has also worked on the 3DS mystery/science-fiction game The Starship Damrey and on certain scenarios of the fantastic 428 (English release 2018). The 8 Mansion Murders however will be the first time one of his novels will be translated into English.

Anyway, I hope you'll have as much fun with The 8 Mansion Murders as I had with translating it. The book will once again feature an introduction by Soji SHIMADA, and (a lot!) of footnotes both by the author himself and me. For those who enjoyed The Decagon House Murders and/or The Moai Island Puzzle, I'd say this is a must-read, as it builds on the same tradition, but with a very different tone from those works.

Make Up Tonight

記憶のファイルを風がめくってくわ

take it easy, it's not easy

「Make Up Tonight」（河合夕子）

The wind's leafing through the files of my memory

Take it easy, it's not easy

"Make Up Tonight" (Kawai Yuuko)

Nazotoki Live ("Mystery Solving Live") is a mystery program produced by NHK with a unique twist: viewers at home (as well as three studio guests) are encouraged to participate actively with the mystery-solving process. The show consists of two parts: a mystery drama part, which is occasionally interrupted by a live studio segment. It's during these breaks that the guests (as well as the viewers) are asked questions related to the mystery drama, that help organize the facts and clues presented in the drama part. Everyone is given a few minutes to think and answer, with points awarded to correct answers (viewers at home can input their answers through their TV remotes, the studio guests can do it live in the studio). Then the show returns to the mystery drama again, and rinse and repeat until the mystery is solved. A perfect score results in eternal fame (a similar show, Anraku Isu Tantei, actually offered a monetary award by the way)

The show appears on television about once a year, and last year, I reviewed 2016's Shikakukan no Misshitsu Satsujin Jiken ("The Murder Case of the Locked Room of the Square House"), which was written by Ayatsuji Yukito. It was the first time I saw the show, but I really loved how they made an otherwise complex mystery very accessible to the viewers at home, as it was a fair mystery plot, but it was also obvious the creators did their best to keep it comprehensible for the viewers at home, as a live mystery drama is another format than a book for example, which asks for different approaches.

The shows are always written by mystery writers, and 2015's entry of this show, Bihakujima Satsujin Jiken ("The Bihaku Island Murder Case"), was written by Abiko Takemaru. In a way, he's perfect for these kinds of shows actually, as he has a lot of experience with recreating the fun of mystery fiction with the help of interactive media. The highly influential novel game Kamaitachi no Yoru was a creation of his for example. The two episodes of this show were broadcast on July 18th and 19th, 2015. Bihaku is a Japanese word meaning 'beautifully white', referring to the classic Japanese idea of beauty that says a woman's skin should be white. The word is often used for skin care products. Bihaku Island is thus a nickname the island got because a local fruit is being used in the products of a succesful make-up company. The director of that company is visiting the island because she'll model for a new company promotion poster. The members of Detective Club CATS, Miko (the brains), Momo (aspirant-photographer) and Momo's brother Ao (policeman) are also part of the group, because Momo got a job as photography assistant. It doesn't take long for Miko, Momo and Ao to see that the director of the make-up company is a rather unpleasant woman, and as decided by the Laws of Mystery Fiction, this director is of course the victim in this murder mystery. Miko and Momo, as well as the studio guests and the viewers back home, will need to figure out what the victim's dying message meant and most importantly: who did it?

For those interested in videogames: it might be interesting to learn that game creator Ishii Jirou was one of the studio guests. He has directed games like 428, but also produced games like 999: Nine Hours, Nine Persons, Nine Doors, so he has quite an affinity for mystery fiction. In fact, he did exceedingly good in this show. Takumi Shuu, creator of the Gyakuten Saiban/Ace Attorney game series, would also be a guest the following year by the way.

I have to be honest, and say that as a mystery show, I think 2016's Shikakukan no Misshitsu Satsujin Jiken was a lot more enjoyable. Not that Bihakujima Satsujin Jiken is a bad mystery story. It's only... too predictable. The mystery genre, like most genre fiction, is very dependent on tropes, whether they're used straight or subverted. Bihakujima Satsujin Jiken however uses all tropes in a rather straight, uninspired way. A dying message? Of course it's never what it seems at first sight. And of course the one with the camera was assaulted because he filmed something he shouldn't have. As a pure whodunnit, this story relies on the old-fashioned 'elimination' method to arrive at the right criminal (identify characteristics the murderer must have or must not have, and then comparing them to those of the suspects, and eliminate everyone who does not fit the description from the list), but the manner in which the list of suspects is cut short is again rather classic, and never surprising. In fact, I think studio guest Ishii commented on each question that 'If we'd go the classic way, then the answer would be...' and he got it right every time. If you're familiar with these kinds of whodunnit mysteries, this story is a bit too classically structured, and there's little new to be found here. I also found it frustrating there were a lot of obvious red herrings. I don't mind red herrings, but at least give them some meaning, rather than dumping a truck load of them in the story, but never bothering to flesh them out in a meaningful manner (like hinting at subplots that never come to fruition because they were just red herrings; that's just lazy. Give them some closure!).

What I think is great about this show is how it allows for mystery stories that are usually too complex for television. The intermezzzos between the drama parts allow for the studio guests, but also the viewers to organize all the new information they get. The goal of the questions asked during these intermezzos are in fact precisely that: organizing information / pushing the ideas of the viewers in the right way. Because there's a bit of help along the way, the stories themselves can become much more complex than the usual mystery drama. You'd think that having to create a fair play mystery with participants (studio guests and people at home) would result in a mystery plot that'd be easier to solve, but not here: the writers make use of the extended time, and the fact they can gently guide people to the solution through the intermezzo questions to create plots that are quite complex.

One important factor is the fact all participants have access to "evidence cards": the necessary clues to solve the mystery. These cards, which show all the characters and evidence (for example, a card with the dying message), allow everyone to keep all the important facts at hand. Another interesting feature is the use of the homepage: during the broadcast of this show, people could go the official website to find additional evidence, like a panorama picture of the crime scene, so people could examine the crime scene themselves. In the studio, they even have handy alibi charts ready for the guests. I really like how the program really gives the viewers at home a good look at everything in detail. With all the facts at hand, the focus is less on small details, but more on the logic of getting everything to fit (and I like that better in a mystery story).

Overall, I'd say Bihakujima Satsujin Jiken is an okay mystery story that fits perfectly with the unique concept of the program, but it's also a story that is rather predictable and perhaps too classic. I had hoped for something like Shikakukan no Misshitsu Satsujin Jiken, which had something extra to surprise the viewer with. I wouldn't say this show was lacking, but it was definitely nothing more than I had expected.

Original Japanese title(s): 『謎解きLive 美白島殺人事件』

A Riddle For Puppets

ほら　ti ta ta ta

ガラスの針 十二回の刻（とき）を打てば

聖なるの夜　七頭の影が

無力な人形　に手を伸ばす

『Marionette Fantasia』 (Garnet Crow)

Look ti ta ta ta

When the glass hands strike twelve

On the holy night, my shadow reaches its hand out

to the lifeless puppet

"Marionette Fantasia" (Garnet Crow)

Clowns. Puppets. I fear them. That's all.

After a great performance at a kindergarten by ventriloquist Yoshio and his little partner Mario, kindergarten teacher Mutsuki 's interest in the shy, but gifted young man is aroused. But as the two get closer, Mutsuki discovers Yoshio has a secret: the puppet Mario isn't just a tool with which Yoshio performs his art, but is a seperate personality within Yoshio. Getting a bit too deep into ventiloquism has given Yoshio both a gift and a curse: his ventriloquism is fantastic, but unlike Yoshio, Mario has a fast mouth and can't always be controlled. But Mario is also in possession of some very impressive deductive facilities, which come in handy as Mutsuki, Yoshio and Mario have a tendency to run into crimes in Abiko Takemaru's short story collection Ningyou wa Kotatsu de Suiri Suru ("The Puppet Deduces From The Kotatsu", 1990), first of a four part series.

Ningyou wa Kotatsu de Suiri Suru is the first story, and lends its name to the collection. After a show in a kindergarten, Mutsuki discovers the secret of Yoshio and Mario. The three work together to find out what the connection is between a series of mysterious events that have been happening at the kindergarten since after Yoshio's show: rabbits have died, a food bucket has been pushed over and other little, yet worrying events. And....the solution is pretty obvious, as it is very similar to that one famous short story of a very, very famous writer. The focus of this story lies not in the mystery of the kindergarten, but simply on the introduction of the main characters Mutsuki, Yoshio and Mario. And even more: the writer goes some length in fleshing out the kindergarten environment, with fellow teachers and the children popping up, but they don't actually reappear in later stories:  in the afterword writer Abiko Takemaru says he had indeed first planned to use the kindergarten as a recurring setting, but for some reason it just didn't happen.

Ningyou wa Tent de Suiri Suru ("The Puppet Deduces In The Tent") is easily the best story in the collection and a fun short locked room mystery too! Yoshio is booked for a big circus-esque outdoor show with magicians, card throwers and other performers and after a great show, Mutsuki, Yoshio and Mario go backstage to one of the resting rooms in the big top circus tent, where they talk with some of the performers. Then one of the performers is found murdered in his own resting room on the other side of the big top, and the only suspect is Yoshio's good friend and fellow ventriloquist Haruka, who was the only person who had entered and left that specific resting room with the victim. The entrance to the room had been under constant observation by people of the staff working nearby, so either Haruka did it, or the murderer managed to get into the observed room... unobserved. The solution Mario comes up with is simple, but good and really fits the atmosphere of the story collection: nothing too complex, but satisfying and quite memorable.

In Ningyou wa Gekijou de Suiri Suru ("The Puppet Deduces In The Theater"), Mutsuki, Yoshio and Mario happen to see the inspector they met in the previous story during a theater perfomance of Der Ring des Nibelungen. They are told about the recent murder of a CEO, who had left a semi-dying message: his diary showed that the victim had been dreaming of being assaulted since a long time ago, by someone or something he called "Siegfried". But the police have no idea whom the victim meant with Siegfried. Even after watching (sleeping through) Der Ring didn't help, so the inspector asks for Mutsuki and Yoshio for help (he doesn't know that Mario's the one who solved the previous case). A semi code cracking / dying message story about finding out the identity of the murderer based on the victim's diary  (similar to Arisugawa Alice's Yaneura no Sanposha) and it's... an okay story. Like many stories that are based on purely the interpretation of a dying message, the final solution can feel a bit arbitrary and this time, it also involves dream interpretations, but I think this was not a bad story at any rate.

And I wouldn't say that the final story, Ningyou wo Nakushita Fukuwajutsushi ("The Ventriloquist Who Lost His Puppet"), is bad per se, but definitely the weakest of the four in this collection. Yoshio is booked for a performance on TV, but the case which holds Mario disappears from the dressing room after Yoshio's show, and then Mario is found 'murdered' in the parking lot of the broadcasting studio. Who would go the trouble of 'killing' a puppet? And can Mutsuki and Yoshio solve the problem and avenge Mario's death? My main complaint about this story is that the main deduction that drives the story towards its conclusion is based on a very ridiculous prejudiced idea, which seemed only appropiate for a fake solution. Also, it's very similar to the first story actually. There's some nice bits about Yoshio having to deal with the death of his other personality, but as a mystery story, I don't really like this finale.

Overall, I think Ningyou wa Kotatsu de Suiri Suru is a fun short story collection. The atmosphere is light and pleasant, with just a bit of main character teasing that we've come to expect from Abiko Takemaru (see also the Hayami siblings series and especially Tooru in the Kamaitachi no Yoru series). A (seperate personality inside a) puppet as an armchair detective is a pretty original and the collection, while short, is quite varied. Ningyou wa Tent de Suiri Suru in particular is quite good as a locked room mystery.

But I can't be the only one who thinks that having a seperate personality represented by a ventriloquist' dummy is a bit creepy, right? It's supposed to be cute and all, I think, but I can't help but think this will all go wrong one day and Mario will go wild.

Anyway, Ningyou wa Kotatsu de Suiri Suru is a short, but fine collection with a slightly scary protagonist, but if you don't have a fear for dolls, you should be fine.

Original Japanese title(s): 我孫子武丸 『人形はこたつで推理する』: 「人形はこたつで推理する」 /  「人形はテントで推理する」 / 「人形は劇場で推理する」 / 「人形をなくした腹話術師」

Risky Room

番人：「そこまで脱獄を・・・一体何がお前をそうさせる？！」

囚人Ａ：「プリゾン・ブレイク！」

囚人Ｂ：「海外ドラマか！マジかよお前？くだらないって」

番人：「…参ったな。あれ、面白いもんな。」

『レッドシアター』：　ジャングルポケットＸ牢屋

Guard: "Why do you want to escape from this prison that much? What is driving you to do all of this?!"

Prisoner A: ".... Prison Break!"

Prisoner B: "A television series! You serious?! That's just stupid!"

Guard: "...Damn. I have to admit, that is really a cool series!"

"Red Theater" Jungle Pocket X Jail Sketch

I said to myself last month, I have a review backlog of four, five items, so I should post a bit more often in November. And then I noticed we're already about one third into the month with just one review finished. Aaargh. Man, november? It's almost time to start thinking about which pieces of mystery fiction I consumed this year were the best!

The 2013 film Kankin Tantei ("The Confined Detectives") starts with a fateful encounter between Ryouta and Akane. Might sound like the start of a romantic movie, if not for the fact the two are standing in the apartment across Ryouta's one, and that the inhabitant of this apartment, the model Rena, lies dead on the floor. Both claim to have just discovered the body, but seeing the doubtful eyes of Akane (a friend of Rena), he decides to take Akane prisoner in his room, until he can find evidence to clear his own name. Akane, tied to Ryouta's bed, however seems not even fazed by her imprisonment and claims she will be able to solve Rena's murder even from the confines of this room. The time limit is the next morning, when Rena's absence from her work will be noticed. Can Ryouta and Akane solve the murder from within this 'locked room'?

When I first heard about this film, I was really interested. It is based on a comic written by Abiko Takemaru (who seems to dabble a lot in 'modern' media like games and manga) and the concept of basically an armchair detective movie, only with the detectives confined to a room, i.e. a locked room mystery of sorts (if you interpret the words in a different way), seemed awesome.

I used the part tense, because while the concept was fun, the execution was less... intellectually stimulating, as it was basically actress Natsuna in a variety of alluring poses tied to a bed. Which is definitely an effective way of making the detective genre film a lot more atttractive.

As a detective story, Kankin Tantei does a lot wrong, but also a little bit good. The first half hour has a great sense of speed, as Akane and Ryouta slowly learn more about each other through deductions (in a Sherlock Holmes way), and try to find out why both of them were in Rena's room. It never goes really deep, but I guess it works for a film (which just offers less room for really deep, abstract deduction chains). It's also in this first half where Akane and Ryouta slowly find out who might have killed Rena and why.

The fact that they first used 'normal' deductions to figure each other out kinda sets the viewer on the wrong track, because a lot of the inital discoveries surrounding Rena's murder is done by the Wondrous Internet and Magic Applications and Hacking For Dummies. Which... is kinda lame. The truth behind Rena's murder is very disappointing too, and the 'hints' laid down are ridiculous; as if they suddenly remembered they actually needed a murderer, and hints leading to him, and forcefully wrote them in the script. A lot of the happenings in this movie feel like script filler (especially the second half of the film), which is seldom a good thing, and especially not in a detective movie, which ideally is a neatly structured story presenting a good mystery.

There is also the 'problem' of Akane sorta trying to escape from her imprisonment. The first few minutes are quite tenseful, when she's tied to the bed (and Ryouta for no other feasible reason but to live out his fantasies sits on top of her as if that is the most logical way to keep a kidnapped girl quiet), and you're not quite sure what's going to happen and if she's going to escape, but after that first part, you'll see plenty of chances for Akane to get help, but she doesn't. The concept of a confined detective, a detective being forced to solve a crime can be quite exiting (see the last story in volume 38 of Detective Conan for example, but here there never seems to be any real danger. Akane teases Ryouta a lot, even though he is supposed to be her imprisoner. It doesn't help that a lot of the scenes of Akane tied up are obvious fanservice shots with actress Natsuna, so it's kinda hard to take them serious.

But I said the film did some good, right? Well, the puzzle of Rena's murderer was solved kinda badly, there is one aspect of the mystery that was actually done quite well. The hints were nicely spread across the whole movie. During the whole film, I had wondered about little bits and pieces of the plot, thinking they were just signs of bad writing, but all these little things actually came together in a logical way and it was quite well done, I think. If only the whole plot had seen this much care.

While not a great movie by any standard, I am glad I can say Kankin Tantei isn't a total wreck and I did find several aspects quite amusing. Not something to really recommend, but if you have nothing else to do, want to see a bit of mystery, a bit of Natsuna tied to a bed, then it's not that bad a film.

Original Japanese title(s): 『監禁探偵』

Murder in Three Acts

「好き好き大好き　好き好き大好き

好き好き大好き　愛しているって言わなきゃ殺す」

『好き好き大好き」(戸川純）

"I love you, I love you, I really love you 

I love you, I love you, I really love you

I love you, I love you, I really love you

If you don't say I love you, I'll kill you"

"I love you, I love you, I really love you" (Togawa Jun)

My first encounter with Abiko Takemaru was probably with the fun Tantei Eiga, but I mostly associate him with games. He is strongly connected with Kamaitachi no Yoru and Trick X Logic, excellent detective games and while not a detective game per se, I have been having a bit of fun with his newest game. Besides the above, I've read his Hayami siblings series, which is a light-hearted, orthodox detective series which usually goes through the familiar and loved motions, but occasoinally has trouble really setting it apart from the crowd. At any rate, these works of his all feature a humorous tone to them, which is why I always associated Abiko with humor. Which might have been wrong.

Abiko Takemaru's 1992 novel Satsuriku ni Itaru Yamai ("Illness Into Massacre") starts with the arrest of Gamou Minoru, a serial killer who had been killing and raping women (in that specific order) in Tokyo. Like the famous Jack the Ripper case, this serial killer also had the nasty habit of cutting off breasts and other body parts from his victims. The story then rewinds and we are told how this horrible case started from the viewpoints of three people: Minoru, the serial killer who has finally found 'true' love by embracing necrophilia; Masako, who lately has started to suspect her son from being the infamous serial killer and Higuchi, an elderly ex-cop, who lost a friend to the serial killer and wishes to find the murderer.

First thing that has to be mentioned: the text can be quite graphic at times. Really graphic. In fact, I really do wonder why it is so graphic. It only seems to be there for the shock-factor. I mean, OK, we have a necrophiliac murderer, so it is already a bit nastier than your regular serial murder mystery, but you really don't have to go into every detail of how and when and especially how. I get it's a horrible murder without pages on how Minoru is getting sexually aroused and how he did this and that to his victims. It's something completely different from the actions we seen taken by romantically clumsy protagonists of Kamaitachi no Yoru and the Hayami siblings series!

Written several years after the infamous little girl murder case (where Miyazaki Tsutomu killed several young girls and sexually abused / ate parts of their corpses), Satsuriku ni itaru Yamai touches upon sensitive parts of the society at the time. And I won't go into that in detail, because I figure there are probably reviews out there that discuss that better than I could and there is probably a lot of material out there that are more informative on the issues of families growing apart, the father as a male role model to the son, etcetera etcetera, but for those interested in the topic, you might want to check out Satsuriku ni itaru Yamai and vice versa.

So is there value in reading Satsuriku ni itaru Yamai, besides the graphic descriptions of the murders? Yes, and no. If you can make it through the murders and manage to get into the tales of the psychopathic Minoru, the paranoid mom and the self-blaming Higuchi, then you'll be served a neat surprise at the end of the story. At the end. After going through all the gory and disturbing murders. It is a fun thing Abiko did here in regards of the plot (though, strictly speaking, it seems to serve no other real function than just being a surprise aimed at the reader), but people might give up halfway through the story, never reaching that special moment. Of course, if you're into slash-horror, than you'll have no problem with the novel and than it's definitely a great read, but don't expect clean blows with blunt instruments and polite, dandy suspects in a country house.

Satsuriku ni itaru Yamai is often counted as one of Abiko Takemaru's best, if not his best novel, which probably depends heavily on your taste in mystery novels. I defintiely like the classic 8 no Satsujin a lot better than this novel,  though it definitely is a memorable one, even if mostly for the gore.

Original Japanese title(s): 我孫子武丸　『殺戮にいたる病』

Haunted House Hang-Up

 「恋人同士だったわけであるまいし、いい加減、ふっきらなければ。いつでも学生時代の思い出を引きずるなて、女々しすぎる　―われながら、そう思う」

『真かまいたちの夜　１１人目の訪問者（サスペクト）』

"It wasn't like we were dating. I have to stop thinking about my student days and get over it like a man, I thought"

"True Night of the Kamaitachi - The Eleventh Suspect"

March will probably be a bit light on review posts, because I'll be moving back to the Netherlands in a few weeks, meaning my reading schedule will suffer a bit. Then again, I haven't been posting in a regular schedule since... quite some time anyway. It wouldn't be much different from previous months, if I were to post four or five reviews in the last week of March, I guess..

Readers of this blog might remember that I absolutely love the Kamaitachi no Yoru ("Night of the Kamaitachi") games. The first game introduced us to the duo of Tooru and Mari, who find themselves trapped with a brutal murderer in a pension cut off from the outside world because of a snowstorm. Tooru and Mari returned also for the second and third game, but with the story of this duo (and the accompanying cast) finished in the third entry, Chunsoft was free to create a new cast and setting for the latest Kamaitachi no Yoru.

Shin Kamaitachi no Yoru 11 Ninme no Suspect ("True Night of the Kamaitachi - The Eleventh Suspect") starts with aspiring young writer Sakamaki Kaito traveling to the prefecture of Iwate to gather information for his newest book. He's booked for a stay at the pension Brownie, which lies somewhere far away in the snowy mountains (of course). At Brownie, Kaito is reunited with Tachibana Kyouka, the girl whom he has been in love with since college and who (secretly) serves as his writing muse (in fact, Kaito only came to Iwate, because Kyouka's parental home is here). Kyouko in return is here in her function as the editor (and aspiring reporter) for a travel magazine. Kaito sees this as a chance to rekindle his friendship with Kyouka, but this wouldn't be a Kamaitachi no Yoru game if something didn't prevent the couple from getting closer: a dead body is found in the bathing area. And disappears. Only to reappear again. With the roads blocked because of the snow and the strange phenomenon of Brownie having eleven guests, even though only ten guests made reservations, a night of fright starts for Kaito and Kyouka.

Kamaitachi no Yoru X3 introduced a complex storyline zapping system, but Shin Kamaitachi no Yoru is in many ways back to the basics. We're back to the simple sound-novel system of having text on the screen (accompanied by backgrounds and silhouettes as the only visuals) and the player is presented with choices at several points, which determine how the story develops. Make the right choices and you unravel the mystery, make the bad choices and you end up dead. Probably. This was done expertly in the first Kamaitachi no Yoru, where it starts out as a 'normal' detective game, but make the wrong deductions and the wrong choices, and everyone starts suspecting each other, usually resulting in splatter-horror. Yet these bad endings don't come out of nowhere and they usually contain small hints that lead you to the real ending.

Which is maybe why I didn't really like Shin Kamaitachi no Yoru. It is the only sound-novel I've played until now where I actually got the real ending in one go. Without seeing one bad end. Normally, you'd be happy with such results, but seeing bad endings is one of the more amusing points of the Kamaitachi no Yoru games. You could make an argument then for me to purposely aiming for bad endings, but that isn't fun either. I want to get fooled, to be tricked into a bad ending. Not trying to die on purpose. This point is also related to how easy this time the story was: I had actually already solved the case before we even found the body (can you call it solving then?), because of the all-too obvious hint that pointed at the murderer. I kept hoping that it wouldn't end up the way I suspected it would, but no such luck.
 
It's of course somewhat of a contradiction, like Takumi Shuu noted: with mysteries, you want to solve the case yourself at one hand, but you want to get baffled by the case too. You want to be able solve it, and also not. It is hard to really solve this conundrum: Takumi Shuu tried to solve it by constantly presenting the player with new, contradicting situations, allowing you to solve, get baffled and solve again. Novels usually only have one solution, giving them only one chance to baffle the reader, which is also the one chance of giving the reader the pleasure of solving case (if they managed it). And I think that Kamaitachi no Yoru coped well with the conundrum by constantly trying to lead you to bad endings (thus baffling / surprising the reader several times), but you do get that triumphant feeling readers also seek when you finally reach that good ending. With Shin Kamaitachi no Yoru, I feel like I missed out on a big part of what makes the series so good.

The things I did like? The original Kamaitachi no Yoru had a slight supernatural tone to it, with people suggesting that 'sickle weasles',  youkai, might have commited the murder. The second game also had this supernatural tone to the story, but the third game got rid of that. This time, we're presented with the legends surrounding good and evil zashiki warashi, which is a really fun theme and actually weaven quite good in the story. Also, I liked the new heroine Kyouka a lot more than old protagonist Mari. Kaito on the other hand is even worse with interacting with his love-interest than old protagonist Tooru, which can be a bit tiring.

Shin Kamaitachi no Yoru is released on both the PlayStation 3 and the PlayStation Vita (I borrowed a Vita), which actually shouldn't really matter for a game that is mostly text. But however Chunsoft felt a need to modernize things. In a bad way. First up is the 3D search mode, that forces players out of the text and has them looking for suspicious spots in a location. This is a first in the series and implemented in quite a bad way (let's ignore the fact that the Vita version is set default at a 3D search mode that uses the gyroscope!): you have no idea what you're supposed to look for and you only get one chance to investigate something. You're just out of luck if you chose to look at the table instead of the chair, even though there is absolutely nothing that would indicate why one item would be more worthy of some attention than the other.

Second problem is the use of voice actors to voice some lines of the characters. The text in Kamaitachi no Yoru is divided in dialogue lines spoken by the characters and the narration, and dialogue lines are often voiced, but not always. Which is really distracting. I'd rather they'd not use voice actors, as I've always felt Kamaitachi no Yoru was closer to a book than to any voiced medium, but if you do choose to use voice actors, voice all lines instead of 70%.

And to make it a real product of its time, Chunsoft also decided that you can download extra content for some extra money. The term DLC (downloadable contents) might not be as familiar to mystery readers as to gamers, but it is ridiculous I'd have to pay extra for scenarios which in previous entries were simply part of the whole package!

Overall a disappointing Kamaitachi no Yoru. This is not the way the series should go, and I hope Chunsoft takes a good look at what they want to do with this series.

Original Japanese title(s): 『真かまいたちの夜　１１人目の訪問者（サスペクト）』

Zero Focus

"The record, therefore, which I am about to set down is the first complete and unedited history of the Greene holocaust. It is, I hope, unnecessary for me to state that I have received official permission for my task. I feel that now the truth should be known, for it is history, and one should not shrink from historical facts. Also, I believe that the credit for the solution of this case should go where it belongs"

"The Greene Murder Case"

Warning: there is a big chance that the next post to be published, will be about Sherlock Holmes reincarnated as a dog. You have been warned.

Man, I have postponing writing the review for 0 no Satsujin for so long, that I actually read the sequel in the meantime. Yes, I am good at postponing things. So let's just make this a double review to get it all over with: today, the last two novels in Abiko Takemaru's Hayami siblings series. I had already reviewed 8 no Satsujin a couple of months ago and this is one of those rare, very rare cases where I read the books in a series 1) in the right order and 2) complete the series within a relatively short space in time.  The first novel in the series (also Abiko Takemaru's debut) was really fun and a well-constructed, but not particularly surprising impossible crime novel I t was not bad in any way however and Abiko has a very easy to read writing style, which makes his novels ideal as 'filler' material between 'heavier' reading material.

Police detective Hayami Kyouzou is having another difficult case in 0 no Satsujin ("The 0 Murders"), surrouding the small family of wealthy (and old!) heiress Fujita Katsu. Her only living relatives are her younger brother Genji and her nephew and niece Kushida Tatsuo and Hiroko. In fact, these people don't have any family of their own either, so these four people are all they have in the world. And someone is killing them, one by one, starting with the poisoning murder on not the old Katsu, but instead her young niece Hiroko! Why kill someone with no money? Who has any reason for killing off a small family with almost no ties to the outside world? Kyouzou has no idea, so he calls in the help of two experts on family holocausts in fiction: his younger brother and sister Shinji and Ichio, who happen to be huge fans of detective fiction.

The novel starts quite surprising with not a Challenge to the Reader, but a Notice of the Writer, where Abiko sorta tells the reader he left enough clues for the reader to deduce who the murderer is, and he is even so nice as to give you a list of suspects, saying that all other characters are definitely not involved with the murders. The tone of the Notice might not be very aggressive, but yes, this is just a nicer written Challenge to the Reader. I thought it pretty interesting as most novels don't feature a Challenge to the Reader until the point where all hints are given, which can also make a Challenge to the Reader come as a surprise. If you are not expecting it to be such a detective novel, your 'reading mode' might be totally different. In that sense, it is more fair to include such a Challenge at the beginning and I think it might also be a remnant of Abiko's time at the Kyoto University Mystery Club, where Guess the Criminal scripts are technically all stories feature a Challenge to the Reader.

The puzzle of the holocaust of the family is rather easy to solve though and while the story is definitely fun to read (again, Abiko's writing style is very easy to read), I wouldn't recommend this novel that easily. I would definitely recommend it if you like Abiko's sense of humor (as seen in his other novels, or Kamaitachi no Yoru) and it is certainly not a bad detective novel (though it is sure to be seen with some disagreeing eyes by some mystery fans), but it is also I think the weakest of the three Hayami sibling novels, with actually little incentives that keep the reader attached to the text besides the easy-to-read style. The slapstick humor is also toned down a bit, which makes 0 no Satsujin a rather dry and short book, that at times feels more like an extended plot-outline than a fullfledged novel.

Möbius no Satsujin ("The Möbius Murders"), set just after the events in the previous novel, presents Kyouzou with a new partner (the female detective Kijima) and a new case: a mysterious series of murders in metropolitan Tokyo. The victims vary from little children to elderly men. The only thing that suggests a link between the seperate murders: notes left at the murder scenes with enigmatic number-sequences on them ("2-2", "3-1" etc.). What is the missing link that exists between the seemingly random murders and will Kyouzou be able to stop the murderer? Meanwhile, we also follow the 'adventures' of a teenager called Shiina Toshio, who together with an unknown partner has been going around killing people...

Möbius no Satsujin starts out as a serial murder case like The ABC Murders, then turns into a missing link story like Cat of Many Tails, interspersed with suspense elements where we follow the named murderer. Seems a bit chaotic, but it works and the first two-thirds of this story are very fun to read. It might feel a bit light for some readers too: Abiko's trademark easy writing and slapstick humor kinda undermines the gravity of a serial killer on the loose in the city, but if you can accept that, this should provide for a few hours of entertainment.

Some elements of the the missing link part of the story are good, some not so. The link between the murders is a pretty original one, but the concept behind the enigmatic number sequences left at the crime scenes is almost impossible to guess a priori. The missing link is also revealed halfway through the story, shifting the focus of the investigation towards finding the murderers, but that part is definitely the worst part of the story, with a really unbelievable identity of Toshio's partner. It might have worked if this story was written in a different tone, but it just doesn't work here. It feels so out of tone, that it leaves a somewhat bad aftertaste, despite the entertaining main body of the story.

Taking these two novels together with 8 no Satsujin, it becomes a bit more clear what Abiko did with this series though. 8 no Satsujin featured an impossible murder, 0 no Satsujin the holocaust of a family, Möbius no Satsujin serial murders and a missing link. With all three novels, Abiko used a famous trope of older detective fiction, which he examined using the characters of Shinji and Ichio. Shinji and Ichio constantly reference Golden Age novels when contemplating about the cases, effectively acting as proxies for the genre-savvy reader. Abiko also subverses the tropes in several ways in his novels (I won't go into details for fear of spoiling people). Of course, the detective genre is one that makes extensive use of tropes and subversing them, but there is a difference between coming up with a new solution for an existing trope in the genre, and actually starting kicking at the fundementals of said tropes. These novels make Abiko's place in the history of New Orthodox novels a bit clearer to me at least.

Taken apart, these novels are certainly amusing stories, but they are not what I'd first think of when talking about the New Orthodox writers. I would not advice people to not read them either though, as they are competently written mystery novels. Taken as a set, the three Hayami siblings novels becme a place Abiko manages to have a small discussion about Golden Age novels. Together, they form a better way to explain his position within New Orthodox detective fiction, but I think that in terms of pure originality, Abiko's influence in the genre of mystery gaming is far more important than his novels, so if you had to choose, I'd say you'd need to go play Kamaitachi no Yoru instead.

Original Japanese title(s): 我孫子武丸　『０の殺人』 『メビウスの殺人』

番外編： うぁぁー

I usually have some requirements for my posts. They usually have to be of at least a certain length. But this is special.

So Ayatsuji Yukito, Abiko Takemaru, Maya Yutaka and Madoi Ban (Van Madoy) walk into a bar... The beginning of a bad joke? No, it is an accurate description of the welcome party for the new members of the Kyoto University Mystery Circle held last Friday. Apparently, these insanely famous OBs occasionally drop by at parties of the Mystery Club. Or they come to play mahjong. Especially mahjong, it seems. Anyhow, the moment Abiko Takemaru and Maya Yutaka entered the room was just fantastic, with every discussion stopping abruptly. The same of course when Ayatsuji Yukito entered, who came a bit later. Words can not even begin to describe the aura of the table of these OBs in the restaurant. Just sitting in the same room was awesome. Even though we all tried to avert our eyes in fear of blinding ourselves of the light radiating from that table.

And I even had a short chat with Ayatsuji-sensei as he signed my copy of Ningyoukan no Satsujin ("The Puppet House Murders") I luckily had with me (some other members ran out to buy books to get them signed). And there is no greater motivation, nor greater pressure for writing a thesis on New Orthodox detective fiction, than being told by the person who started the New Orthodox movement that he wants to read your thesis when it is finished. Especially if he even mentions you on his twitter-feed.

I guess I have to write a good thesis now, right?

The Hollow Man

「いいわよ、いいわよ。美人は人殺しなんてしないのよね。嘘もつかないし、おならもしない」

"So beautiful woman don't kill. They don't lie. They don't fart. Right?"

"The 8 Murders"

I am still not sure whether it is a smart idea for my thesis topic (which I am supposed to work on here), my hobby and my club to all be about the same topic. But there are of course good parts to it. I spent the whole day reading a book, but at least I can sorta say that I worked on my thesis. And prepared somewhat for the Mystery Club meeting on Friday. And that I have something to write about on my blog.

It is no coincidence that I read Abiko Takemaru's 8 no Satsujin ("The 8 Murders") after Arisugawa Alice's Gekkou Game. For both of these writers are 'founding' members of the New Orthodox movement and these two books also happen to be their debut works. If you take a look in the library, you'll notice that I have reviewed a couple of Abiko's works, most of the being original scenarios for videogames (including the awesome Kamaitachi no Yoru). Yet I was never sure whether the scenario's he penned for videogames were similar to his novels, so I was interested in seeing how 8 no Satsujin would turn out. The story opens with the murder (by crossbow!) on Hachisuka Kikuichirou, the son of the director of Hachisuka Construction. The murder was committed in the Hachisuka mansion, commonly known as the "Eight Mansion", because of the strange design featuring an inner courtyard, resulting in an 'eight'-like shape when viewed from above. Eyewitnesses claim to have seen the murderer shoot from the room of the son of the mansion's caretaker, but the son naturally denies having commited the murder and to be honest, even the eyewitnesses themselves don't believe he could have done it. But the fact remains that his room was locked (and he was sleeping there), so it was not possible for someone else to have entered that room to shoot the crossbow.

Well, unless the murderer could fly and walk through walls, which would account for the second murder, where forensics say the arrow was shot from a place only someone with wings could have been! And because police inspector Hayami Kyouzou is having troubles solving the case himself, he allows his younger brother and sister, Shinji and Ichio, two self-professed mystery freaks, to help him with this case. Because who besides mystery fans could solve these kind of crimes?

First thing that I noticed: Abiko really likes teasing his characters. I thought it was just something specific to Kamaitachi no Yoru, but Abiko seems to like to put people in awkard situations and see them suffering. The things Hayami's subordinate Kinoshita has to suffer through are just horrible, but Shinji and Ichio are just as happy to tease their big brother about everything. There is a distinct humorous tone to Abiko's writing and while I prefer the comedy-mystery fusion Higashigawa Tokuya offers, Abiko's stories should appeal to those with a want for a humorous (and slightly sadistic) tone to their stories. His writing style is also very easy to read through, and it should take not that much time to go through.

As a debut work of someone from the Kyoto University Mystery Club, it is tempting to compare it to books like Gekkou Game and Jukkakukan no Satsujin. What is funny is that 8 no Satsujin feels quite different from those books actually: there is no university mystery club featured heavily in the story, no closed circle setting, students don't feature as the protagonists. Heck, while Shinji and Ichio are the brains of the Hayami siblings, Kyouzou is still part of the team and he is an actual police detective, so they can't even be considered 100% amateur detectives. Is 8 no Satsujin different from the other two, or are the two books mentioned just very similar? There is of course a lot similar too: most visible in the distinct meta-conscious writing style. We have tons of references to the classics here (including a couple of references that sadly enough border on the spoiler-ific) and we even have a genuine locked room lecture, which Shinji himselves considers a continuation of especially Carr's famous one from The Hollow Man. Carr is actually referenced a lot in this story, which is understandable seeing the (seemingly) impossible crime situations here.

The impossible crimes are... perhaps somewhat easy to solve however. The first one is very easy to see through, because it is based on a very old trick. It only becomes more confusing if you add in the second murder, which again is not that surprising as a stand-alone murder, but it can work quite effectively if you manage to add it in just the right impossible-looking ingredients. Abiko is relatively successful with that, but I have the same feeling with this book like I have with Kamaitachi no Yoru and the other stories I've read of him: he can write very entertaining, his tricks are not bad and he is certainly knowledgable about the genre, but the elements on their own are not surprising. I've yet to see something as imposing as Sensei Jutsu Satsujin Jiken or Jukkakukan no Satsujin. Abiko is certainly an above average writer, but I've yet to see a trick that moves the heavens. Or something like that.

Oh, and going back to the closed circle thing I mentioned (sorry, I write these reviews just as I go, without making drafts and I really hate having to re-arrange everything again). In their debut works, Ayatsuji and Arisugawa both went through the troubles to create closed circle situations, cutting the people off from modern day forensics / police forces / other information lines. By doing this and explictly addressing this, these two writers showed that there was indeed the problem of technology and other things that upset the 'old' model of the detective novel and while their 'solutions' were kinda artificial (though Ayatsuji's approach certainly has its merits), it showed that both writers were trying to get the old model to work in modern times. Abiko's 8 no Satsujin hardly shows such ambitions and it could have been set in any time and place. Heck, I am not even sure whether it was set in contemporary times!

8 no Satsujin is thus a pleasant  (and especially funny) read, but at times struggles to be truly surprising, though it keeps up a high, consistent level.  It is a 'safe' story, doing the things it should do as a locked room murder mystery in a more than adequate way and it also offers some of the distinct meta-conscious, New Orthodox storytelling, but it lacks a bit of the unexpected other writers of the same generation had.

And now I need more sleep. Why does it always takes weeks for me to get back to a normal sleeping routine in Japan?

Original Japanese title(s): 我孫子武丸　『８の殺人』

「えぇ、俺まだ分かってへんで！」

ぼく達は

A) 一旦部屋に戻って着替えると、玄関脇の談話室で落ち合った。

B) 一旦部屋に戻って着替えて、夕食までどちらかの部屋で話でもしようということになった。

『かまいたちの夜』

有野：　いや、でもちょっと、いろんな人がおるところにいって、ぼく結構社交的な面あるんですよって真理にみせる方がいいと思う。ちょっと『ときメモ』風の考えですけど

『ゲームセンターＣＸ』 #113

We...

A) went to back to our rooms to change our clothes and met at the lounge next to the entrance.

B) decided to go back to our rooms to change our clothes and talk in one of our rooms until dinner

("The Night of the Kamaitachi")

Arino: Wait, but, I think it's better to go to a place with all kinds of people, to show to Mari that I'm pretty sociable.  That's kinda more like TokiMemo though...

(Game Center CX #113)

It's funny if you think about it, but the only Choose Your Own Adventure books I have are of Super Mario Bros. Why would I need a gamebook of a game?  I had fun with them though, reading the stories, collecting items and going through all the possible endings. So it's not strange I enjoy Chunsoft's sound novels. 'Cause they are basically CYOA-esque games: interactive fiction accompanied by images and audio where you advance in the story by making choices, with as goal finding the best ending. These sound novels are usually a lot more complex than your average CYOA book though, with countless of multiple choice decision points that affect the way the storyline will develop. Especially Chunsoft's 428 ~ Fuusa sareta Shibuya de ("428 ~In a Sealed Shibuya") is amazing, with five seperate storylines that intersect at certain points, with the decisions made in one storyline affecting the other storylines.

Kamaitachi no Yoru ("Night of the Kamaitachi") is one of the more famous sound novels (maybe the most famous?) and the second sound novel Chunsoft made.  It was a big hit when it first hit the Super Famicom and has been ported to other systems like the PlaySation and GameBoy Advance. And the series is still going strong apparently, with even a new entry announced for the PlaySation Vita. At any rate, Kamaitachi no Yoru is considered a pretty important title in the Japanese game world.

And the fact that I discuss the game here pretty much gives it away, but Kamaitachi no Yoru is basically nothing more or less than an orthodox mystery sound novel.  The scenario was penned by Abiko Takemaru, a mystery writer who seems to have a very close connection with Chunsoft (he also contributed to 428 ~ Fuusa sareta Shibuya de and Trick X Logic). The story is a pretty basic one: protagonists Tooru and his sorta girlfriend Mari are on vacation, staying at the ski pension of Mari's uncle. One night, during a snow storm, one of the guests, or to be exact, many pieces of one of the guests are found in his room. A murder! In a secluded ski lodge in a snow storm? Who would have expected that?! But the more important question is: Who did this? Someone from outside? Or one of the people in the pension? Or are the titular kamaitachi to blame?

As this is still considered a game, it is expected that the player solves the mystery himself (taking up the role of Tooru). And it's here where the sound novel feels superior to 'normal' books. As you control Tooru, you get to choose what actions to take. Do you suspect someone in the pension? Do you make your suspicions clear to the other people, or  do you wait until you can get some more information? At certain points in the story you are offered the choice what to do next and this has influence on the rest of the story.

Although the basic premise (people locked up in a snow lodge with a murderer) seems pretty standard and not particularly exciting, it's fun to see how the story changes by the little choices people make.There are literally dozens of decision points in the story and more importantly: one choice can completely change the story. With every decision point, the story changes a little, making it possible to play through the game dozens of times and still experience a totally different story everytime. In fact, there is a flow-chart included in the game to show what choices you have made and how your story is developing.

And it's really needed, as there are many, many endings. One time, my story ended with the death of everyone in the pension (including myself!) except for the killer. Which is not a good ending. In another ending, I ended up outside the pension before any murders happened, only to come back to find everyone killed.Which isn't a good ending either. In another, more light-hearted ending, I ended up as the director of a small firm, apparently having left the ski pension before the murders happened.

In one of my better endings, I did solve the murders (plural), but it was also possible to solve the case earlier in the story, resulting in fewer casualties. So the reader/player has direct influence on the developments in the story. With the changes in the story, the tone of the story also changes in the latter half of the game: the more murders happen. the more the story changes into a horror-flick, with everyone afraid of an unknown assaillant.

It might sound boring having to wade through a load of endings in search of the true ending, but it's actually really fun. Bad endings are just as amusing as the good endings, so coming across a bad ending doesn't really feel bad: it's just another variation on the same basic story. And while you might know the basic story, the changes that lead up to the various endings do prevent the story from becoming boring. In fact, even the bad endings contain little clues to the real murderer, so bad endings really aren't that bad.

As a mystery game, Kamaitachi no Yoru is awesome and the plot penned Abiko Takemaru (including the variation endings) is pretty interesting, even if it's a bit standard. The 'true' ending is not too difficult to deduce for a more experienced reader of the genre (making use of some rather 'standard' tropes), but the whole concept of mystery novel in such a form is really neat. Sound novels combine the ease of a written story with the interactivity found in games (as well as being more attractive audiovisually) in a very effective way IMHO.

And yes, this probably works best in a videogame setting. While I wouldn't mind CYOA mystery novels, the complexity of such a plot is best done in a videogame. I mean, without the big flow-charts to show every decision point and the way the story nodes are connected and instant jump-functions, Kamaitachi no Yoru (and other sound novels) would probably be less appealing

Original Japanese title(s): 『かまいたちの夜』