Last year, I was surprised by a sudden new release in Higashigawa Tokuya's Koigakubo Academy series, and today's book was the surprise this year. I wonder what next year will bring!?
Disclosure: I translated Higashigawa Tokuya's Lending the Key to the Locked Room. Different series, also a comedic puzzler!
Nazotoki wa Dinner no Ato de (first impressions TV drama)
Nazotoki wa Dinner no Ato de (theatrical release)
Nazotoki wa Dinner no Ato de (audio drama)
Higashigawa Tokuya's Nazotoki wa Dinner no Ato de series is one that has been discussed irregularly in various forms here ever since I started this blog, which should probably give you an idea of how much of a fan I am of this series. It was the excellent 2011 hit drama adaptation (+ theatrical release) which also carried the English title The After-Dinner Mysteries that informed me of this series' existence, but I have of course also enjoyed the original short story collections greatly. The series is about Houshou Reiko, a young female homicide detective. But none of her colleagues know that Reiko's actually the stupidly wealthy sole heiress of the Houshou Group, a pillar of the Japanese economy. Every evening she returns home after a long day of work to enjoy the luxurious banquet awaiting her, as she ponders out loud about the cases she's working on. Her butler Kageyama seems to have a knack for detecting too, as he is always able to solve the most mysterious cases just by listening to his mistress. Kageyama however also has the habit to be a bit sharp-tongued when it comes to commenting on his mistress' intellligence as he solves each case for her. While Reiko hates the insulting (and completely unnecessary) jabs Kageyama fires at her constantly, she has to admit that her butler is truly a brilliant 'armchair' detective who has helped her solve many cases. Over the course of three volumes, Reiko was submitted to a lot of shade by Kageyama, but they also solved many cases, but the series went silent after the third volume, originally released in 2012 (the pocket release added a neat crossover with Detective Conan by the way!).
Kazamatsuri Keibu no Kikan ("The Return of Inspector Kazamatsuri") brings Kazamatsuri back to Kunidachi Police Station to Reiko's great surprise/disappointment, and Reiko and Airi have to work with the returning inspector immediately on the apparent suicide of Kunieda Masafumi, the oldest son of Kunieda Yoshio, the founder of the famous Kunieda Manufacturing company. Masafumi was found hanging from the ceiling in his own room, which at first suggest suicide, but there are still some minor doubts about his death, especially as Yoshio is expected to die soon and his second son Keisuke isn't actually blood-related to his older brother, meaning there's a motive for murder somewhere. Keisuke and the other people who were at the Kunieda residence at the time of the death however all have alibis: Masafumi had been working in his room the whole day, while Keisuke was visited by a friend. Keisuke showed his friend the whole, and also tried to introduce him to his brother, who was not in his room at the moment. After that time, everyone was together at the dining table save for Masafumi, who was later found hanging in his room, which happened after Keisuke and his friend swung by his room. But as there was nobody else in the house, Masafumi must've committed suicide, right? The trick of how Masafumi was hanged in his room while everybody in the house had an alibi is rather esay to guess, especially once a certain object is mentioned. I doubt anyone will be seriously surprised by the trick and in that respect, I found the story a bit disappointing as I thought it was waaaaay to obvious what was done. That said, there's a clue in this story that's absolutely brilliantly hidden, and that really made up for my initial disappointment. While it is easy to guess how it was done, this clue actually proves the trick had been used and arriving at this clue is definitely a lot harder than just imagining 'the murderer probably did this and this to commit the murder.' So you could see this as a double-layered story, where the first layer is very obvious, but the second layer cleverly hidden.
Reiko and Airi are investigating the murder on the elderly Shimoirisa Masaru in Chimoji wa Misshitsu no Naka ("The Bloody Writing Is Inside The Locked Room"). The victim was discovered inside the locked storage room in the garden, broken open by the victim's second daughter and his son-in-law (husband of the oldest daughter) who both happened to be visiting the old man that morning and couldn't find him inside the house. When they noticed some blood beneath the door of the storage room, they broke the door open to find the man dead. But there were also clues inside: the victim collected art and a valuable pot made of Satsuma kiriko glass was missing from the storage and most damning of all, the victim had written the name Nakata in blood on the floor. The case seems clear-cut, as the police start looking for someone named Nakata among the victim's acquaintances. As the police investigation continues, they find more clues that seem to indicate this Nakata, but still things don't seem to add up quite perfectly, and it's Kageyama who manages to put a completely different light on the manner. This is a story that focuses more on the why of the locked room than the how, and it's perfectly fine concept on its own, but it's a bit simple. The story is rather economical in set-up, so nothing really surprises: when you hear why the victim was found in a locked room, you'll find it a clever idea, but the story is so short little is done to really show the effects and implications that arise from the creation of the locked room, somewhat undermining its whole concept. The idea is executed perhaps a bit too minimalistically to really make an impression.
Itsutsu no Mezamashidokei ("The Five Alarm Clocks") is of course inspired by Ayukawa Tetsuya's The Five Clocks (disclosure: it's included in The Red Locked Room which I translated) and starts with Ryuuji and Mamoru chatting in the morning after ending their night shift. Ryuuji invites Mamoru to his place, a house near the train station he shares with a few other people. Lured by the fact that one of the other people living there is a genuine nurse, Mamoru follows Ryuuji to the house, but on their way to Ryuuji's home, they hear two alarm clocks going off in the nurse's room, but no sign of her switching the alarm off. Sensing something is wrong, they go inside and find her strangled, though miraculously still alive and she's swiftly brought to the hospital. When the police investigate the room of the victim, they stumble upon a surprising sight: the victim had five alarm clocks set in her room: two clocks near the head of her bed, two beneath her bed and one on the table in front of her television. The alarm clocks were all set around, but at different times, suggesting the woman probably had trouble getting up each morning, which is why she set five alarm clocks at five minute intervals to ensure she'd get up and not just switch the alarm off and go back to sleep again. Reiko and Airi question the other inhabitants of the house, learning that the nurse had to go out last night suddenly because of an emergency at the hospital which turned out to be a fluke, but that there didn't seem anything wrong when she returned. When she was found this morning, three of her alarm clocks had been switched off, but the last two went off and were still going when she was discovered, meaning she had switched those clocks off and was probably strangled just minutes before she was discovered. But none of the three people present inside the house that morning have a clear alibi, so can these clocks help point out who did it? An interesting take on The Five Clocks, because this time we don't have one single alibi vouched for by five clocks, but it's the time of the crime that is indicated due to the alarm setting of the clocks. It's an original way to indicate the time of the murder and the result is a story that's fun to read: it's very simple in set-up, set inside the shared residence and with only a few characters, but the deduction chain built upon the five different alarm clocks, the implication of the five minute intervals between them, and the way the reader is eventually brought to the culprit is very clever: at first you think the clocks can't mean much because ultimately, none of the three suspects have a clear alibi for the time of the attack, but the thing is twisted around surprisingly by showing the clocks do prove something else.
Tabako 2 Honbun no Alibi ("An Alibi Two Cigarettes Long") is a story that doesn't have any especially memorable or outstanding aspects to the core crime, but it's actually one of the better plotted stories in the volume, showing off Higashigawa's talent to control the actions of his characters to create (semi-)impossible crimes and perfect alibis. This time, Reiko and Airi are put on the case of a student killed in his own apartment room, soon after the victim returned home around eight in the evening. By sheer coincidence, someone had been smoking two cigarettes at the front gate of the victim's apartment building around that time, and this witness claims he always takes five minutes for one cigarette. During his break, he saw a fat man enter the building and ran way a few minutes later, who is suspected to be the murderer and the police soon find three suspects among the victim's acquaintances, who fit the profile, may have a motive and were in the neighborhood around the time of the crime. The suspects all have partially vouched alibis around the time of the crime, but because they were all within walking distance of the scene of the crime, and the witness' testimony relies solely on his estimation of how long he was smoking, it's difficult to pinpoint at what time the suspect fled the building, which in turn means they can't eliminate any of the suspects indefinitely. The puzzle piece that allows you to connect the various testimonies together and construct a precise timetable is devilishly clever, being an incredibly simple and common thing that people do, but which you probably won't think off until it's mentioned in the story. Once you're reminded of it, you'll be able to piece together what really happened on the night of the murder and which of the suspects could've committed the murder. There's no 'grand' situation like a locked room or a corpse which seems to come out of nowhere, but as a puzzler, it's really satisfying.
By the way, is it just me, or is Kageyama a lot milder compared to the previous books? His verbal abuse of his mistress seems less... sharp than before. Guess he softened in these last years...
On the whole, Shin Nazotoki wa Dinner no Ato de is a nice return of the series. The banter is between pleasantly crazy characters is fun as always and while I don't think that any of the five stories found in this volume rank among the best mystery stories of the series, I think they all have something interesting to offer, from original settings to cleverly plotted roadmaps leading to the culprit or shrewdly hidden clues that are both brilliant and oh-so simple at the same time. If you're a fan of the series, this is a must-read, as it's basically 'more of the same', but that's not a bad thing at all.
