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 Ice-Cold Case

Oh, this is the first time I read a book in this series since the publication of the English translation of Lending the Key to the Locked Room. Which immediately brings me to:

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!")

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

The never really succesful private detective Ukai and his assistant Ryuuhei are hired by Komine Saburou, one of the wealthiest men in Ikagawa City. His entertainment facilities like karaoke boxes and batting centres provide the young people with something to do in this otherwise boring city, but Komine has a rather exciting job for Ukai. For Komine has recently received a threatening letter, which speaks of "revenge" among other things. Komine claims he has no idea what the letter is about, even though both Ukai and Ryuuhei suspect there's something shady about the man, but he wants Ukai to act as his bodyguard the coming days. While Ukai isn't really willing to jump in front of his portly client if some assailant would fire a pistol at the man, he agrees to take the job. Komine always spends the days around Christmas at the Squid House, a small hotel set in a secluded and private location as it stands at the very end of Tentacle Peak outside Ikagawa City. The day they drive off to the hotel also turns out to be the day with a tremendous snow storm, and on their way to Tentacle Peak, they find a young man who crashed his car in the storm. They take the unconscious man with them to the hotel and while luckily, one of the other guests here is a doctor, they are now all snowed in at Tentacle Peak for the moment. Ukai and Ryuuhei notice that their client has been acting very differently ever since he learned the name of the unconscious man however, and the following day, they find the unconscious man has disappeared from the room he had been sleeping in. Ukai decides to inform Inspector Sunagawa about these events, who immediately suspects something fishy is going on when he learns that Komine Saburou is involved: twenty years ago, when Inspector Sunagawa was still a rookie detective, he was involved with a gruesome murder case where the victim, Komine Tarou, had been cut in pieces. Saburou was the youngest brother of three, and the middle brother Jirou was identified as the murder suspect, but he disappeared twenty years ago. Sunagawa recounts this old case to his subordinate Shiki while they wait for the snow to calm down, but meanwhile at the Squid House, Saburou gets murdered himself. What is going on and how is the current case connected to what happened twenty years ago? That is the big mystery in Higashigawa Tokuya's Squid-sou no Satsujin ("The Squid House Murders", 2022).

Squid-sou no Satsujin is the long-awaited newest novel in Higashigawa Tokuya's Ikagawa City series, a comedic mystery series set in the titular city with an ensemble cast where we follow the (mis)adventures of private detective Ukai, his assistant/former brother-in-law Ryuuhei, Inspector Sunagawa, his subordinate Shiki and more characters. Koko ni Shitai wo Sutenaide Kudasai! ("Don't Dump Your Bodies Here Please!") from 2009 was the last novel-length entry in the series for a long time, and while it was followed by a few short story collections,  13 years is a rather long wait! While I have reviewed all the novels in the series, I haven't discussed the short story collections here yet, by the way. Some might find this strange, considering my love for the short story format, but some of the short stories I already know through the live-action drama series or anthologies, so the collections aren't really high priority, though I guess now I have read all the novels, I might as well get started on the collections too. Some will know that I really love Higashigawa's work and his distinctive style of combining slapstick comedy with really solid mystery plots and clewing and his work has been discussed very regularly on this blog.

Anyway, so back to Squid-sou no Satsujin. With a title like that, you're of course expecting something like Ayatsuji Yukito's House series: a closed circle mystery set in the titular Squid House with secrets and dark pasts. And early on, we are told about a past case where a body got cut up in six parts, and in the present, we're presented with situations that seem impossible at first sight, with the unconscious man disappearing from the hotel grounds and later Komine Saburou too disappearing from his cottage only to be found murdered later, and his murderer even manages to disappear even though Ukai chased them in the woods. I seldomly read story descriptions, so perhaps I was expecting too much simply based on the title of this book, for I was really expecting a classic country house style mystery, and I have to admit that at first, I was pretty disappointed when about half-way through the book, I realized that Squid-sou no Satsujin wasn't even trying to be anything of the things I described above. The "impossibilities" only seem like that for a few pages, but are immediately proven to be not impossible situations at all and the book doesn't even try to present them like that. The Squid House, while in possession of "a past", isn't really the super-atmospheric location with hidden passageways and some horrible dark secret you'd expect it to be based on the title and is... a pretty normal hotel all things considered. 

But in the end, I really did enjoy Squid-sou no Satsujin as a mystery novel, and it basically accomplished that by doing everything this series has always done in a great way, and not straying far from what you'd expect and want from an Ikagawa City novel. Like most stories in this series, the book follows a dual structure, with chapters alternating between the adventures of Ukai and Ryuuhei at the Squid House, and Inspector Sunagawa telling about what happened twenty years ago. Part of the msytery lies in realizing how these two events are connected exactly. For yes, Komine Saburou is the connecting factor, but what exactly happened twenty years ago, and how does that affect the current case? What works really well here is that a lot of the connections will seem rather obvious at first, but it's those small parts that don't really seem to fit that really start to bug you, and you know *something* isn't quite right, but it is difficult to identify exactly what. Elements like the unconscious man appear to be troublesome puzzle pieces that don't quite fit in either puzzle and this sense of uneasiness, where the "big picture" seems to fit save for some details, but you also know that's those details that are most important, can be felt throughout the book. The book therefore has a slightly slow start, as a lot of the mystery isn't immediately obvious to the reader, but as the book goes on and the two narratives slowly reach their respective climaxes, this sense of mystery, of knowing you don't know what is going on, becomes more tangible. And the explanation to all of this is great, and exactly what I'd expect from this series. There's some brilliant misdirection going on in this book and as always, a lot of clewing is hidden cleverly in the comedy. The moment you finally realize how those puzzle pieces that didn't seem to fit actually look like, is absolutely fantastic, as that's also when you see how those "sometimes long-winded comedy sections" were actually meant to point you in the right direction as a clue, and you simply completely missed the big shiny pointer. In essence, the "big puzzle piece" that connects the two cases is fairly simple, but it's executed great here and despite my earlier disappointment with this book not really being about an impossible crime or really using the country house murder format, I think this book manages to present a great mystery story.

So Squid-sou no Satsujin might not be exactly what you'd think it be based on the title alone, but taken on its own merits, and as an entry in the Ikagawa City series, it's a very solid entry, doing everything you should expect from this series in a great way, and ultimately even presenting a rather surprising solution that is both a bit silly (as you may expect from this series), but also cleverly clewed and in hindsight using a rather impressive act of misdirection. For those who have enjoyed the series before, Squid-sou no Satsujin is definitely a must-read.

Original Japanese title(s): 東川篤哉『スクイッド荘の殺人』

番外編：Lending the Key to the Locked Room Released

When The Red Locked Room was released earlier this year, I mentioned how Locked Room International didn't have a full-length Japanese release in 2019 after the annual releases of The Decagon House Murders (2015), The Moai Island Puzzle (2016), The Ginza Ghost (2017) and The 8 Mansion Murders (2018). And that's why I assume few people were expecting to see Locked Room International publishing two of these books translated by me this year.

Whereas the spring release The Red Locked Room was a short story collection, I'm pleased to say that we have something for lovers of novels too this year. Tokuya Higashigawa is a name which has been featured a lot on this blog, as he's a personal favorite of mine. The current president of the Honkaku Mystery Writers Club of Japan specializes in comedic mystery stories, but don't let the antics in his novels fool you, as the comedy is also camouflage for cleverly-plotted mysteries. Lending the Key to the Locked Room (Misshitsu no Kagi Kashimasu, 2002) was his first full-length novel and also the first novel in his popular Ikagawa City series, which is currently still running. This series is perhaps unique in the sense that while it's a series, there's no fixed detective character. These stories set in and around the titular city feature an ensemble cast with different colorful characters all solving part of the mystery. Or they make things more confusing. In Lending the Key to the Locked Room, the reader is introduced to the college student Ryuhei who finds himself in a lot of trouble: what should've been a nice night watching a mystery film together with a friend in a private home theatre, ends with him discovering his friend's dead body, but the apartment is completely locked from the inside, meaning the only viable suspect for his friend's murder is.... Ryuhei himself! And he's pretty sure he didn't do it. When Ryuhei learns that the police is after him for another murder, he seeks help from his ex-brother-in-law, the hapless private detective Ukai who at times seems like he's in complete control and at times completely out of his depth with this case. Solving a locked room mystery is hard enough without the police chasing after you...

I first read the book myself in 2011, and in the review I wrote "A funny novel with a satisfying plot-structure that is sure to entertain the reader," which is an opinion I still had when I went through the book again while translating it. And on a side-note: huh, that was the first review since this blog got its current look. But it's no secret that I love mystery stories with a comedic atmosphere and Higashigawa always delivers in that respect. Higashigawa's work has been rather popular on the screen too by the way, with numerous adaptations of his novels. The best-known adaptation is probably the series and movie of Nazotoki wa Dinner no Ato de AKA The After-Dinner Mysteries, but the Ikagawa City series, including Lending the Key to the Locked Room, had an entertaining television adaptation too in 2014.

 

Anyway, I hope the release of Lending the Key to the Locked Room is a nice end-of-year surprise for you. It's a genuinely entertaining locked room mystery that sure got me hooked on Higashigawa's mystery stories (seriously though, I'm going through old reviews now for this post and I only now realized this novel was the first full-length book of Higashigawa I ever reviewed). And if you're still looking for some more winter reading, why not try The Red Locked Room or perhaps the re-released The Decagon House Murders?

The Vanishing Game

 「死体の入れ物といえば、これに勝るものはない」

『ここに死体を捨てないでください！」

"There was nothing better than that to put a dead body in."

"Don't Dump Your Bodies Here Please!"

Oh, wow, it's been this long since I last read a book in Higashigawa Tokuya's Ikagawashi series? Man, at one time I was reading at least one of these books a year....

Koko ni Shitai wo Sutenaide Kudasai! ("Don't Dump Your Bodies Here Please!" 2009) opens with a a phone call from Kaori's younger sister Haruka, which turned Kaori's day complete upside down. It was still early in the day when an unknown woman suddenly barged into Haruka's apartment, and in her sheer surprise and fear, Haruka accidently stabbed the woman with her fruit knife. Unwisely, Haruka fled her room, leaving the body behind. By the time she had come to her senses, she found herself in another prefecture and called to her sister for help. Figuring that the police isn't likely to believe her younger sister's story, especially as she fled the scene of the crime, Kaori declares she'll take care of everything for her younger sister. Kaori learns her sister did really tell her the truth, as the dead body is still lying in Haruka's kitchen. Going through the victim's wallet, she learns the victim was called Yamada Keiko, a woman who had no connections whatsover to Haruka. Kaori decides she needs to move the body away from Haruka's room, and dupes the young man Tetsuo into helping her. Tetsuo drives a truck collecting large recyclable trash, and they decide to use the old contrabass case he collected to hide Keiko's body in. They drive off in Keiko's car, and after wandering around the edges of town to find a place to dump the body, they decide to drive the car, with Keiko inside, into the allegedly bottomless Moon Crescent Lake on Bonkura Mountain outside Ikagawashi City. It's only after they've sunk the car the two realize they're now stuck on the mountain without a car and after a long, long time of being lost, they find refuge in an inn with hot springs on the mountain. What should've been the end of a long night however is just the beginning, as it just so happens a certain private detective, his asssistant and their landlord have also arrived at the same inn, as they are looking for a client who never showed up for her appointment: a certain Yamada Keiko.

Like I said, I read a lot of the Ikagawashi series in the earlier days of this blog, but my last review related to this series dates from 2014, when I reviewed the TV drama Watashi no Kirai na Tantei ("The Detective I Don't Like"), based on the books of this series. Like most of Higashigawa Tokuya's series, the Ikagawashi series is a humorous detective series, which combines snappy dialogues and slapstick comedy with proper puzzle mystery plots. This series is particularly unique in that it basically has no fixed main detective character, and the series is therefore titled after the city where these cases take place. The overly self-confident private detective Ukai Morio, his slow-witted assistant Ryuuhei and their landlord Akemi (who doesn't like poking around as a detective, but simply needs to make sure Ukai pays his rent) are often at the center of things, but usually Inspectors Sunagawa and Shiki also end up as focus characters, and any of these characters is able to solve (part of) the mystery at hand.

Koko ni Shitai wo Sutenaide Kudasai! too has three perspectives for the reader. First we have Kaori and Tetsuo, who dumped the body and are then treated to several surprises at the inn. First they find that a weird middle-aged man (Ukai Morio) is asking around about Yamada Keiko, and with time, Kaori and Tetsuo even start to suspect Ukai, Ryuuhei and Akemi killed the woman in Haruka's room, not knowing that at the exact same time Ukai and Akemi arrive at the conclusion that Kaori and Tetsuo must've done killed their client who never showed up! And then there's the police, who have their own suspicions too. A lot of the comedy is derived from seeing the same situation from various perspectives, but that's of course also the way the reader will eventually solve the puzzle. Several other incidents occur in this novel besides the mysterous death of Yamada Keiko: the following day, the owner of the inn they're all staying is found dead, ostenstibly drowned after he fell into the river during a midnight fishing session. There are also suspicions of foul play, but it seems that most of the viable suspects have a perfect alibi, as they were watching a live soccer game of the national team together, making it impossible for most of them to go all the way to the man's fishing spot and back in time. Kaori and Tetsuo are also confronted with another surprise: they happen to come to Moon Crescent Lake the following day again, but not only learn it isn't even remotely 'bottomless', they are unable to find the car they dumped despite the super clean and clear water of the lake! But why did somebody remove the car with Keiko's body from the lake and how?

Koko ni Shitai wo Sutenaide Kudasai! keeps the reader from start to finish entertained by juggling between these various characters and showing everything from various perspectives, and this structure definitely helps out the underlying mystery plot, as it'd be a bit simple if left on its own. Some of the elements are somewhat easy to guess, for example the matter what Yamada Keiko was doing in Haruka's apartment anyway, though the death of the owner of the inn, and the disappearance of the dumped car are linked in an interesting manner with a somewhat original solution, though I do have trouble imagining how practical this trick would actually be. There are some neat, but obvious clues left here and there and overall, this is a very fair mystery novel that isn't too hard and can be quite satisyfying to read.

Oh, and a small note, but don't you just hate it when they suddenly change the style of covers suddenly? The earlier pocket releases of this series featured a very different style, but at some point they changed it to have these comic characters, and republished the older novels too with the new covers. The thing is: I think these new covers are really fun. So now I have the four older pockets in the old style, and only this novel in the new but better style...

Koko ni Shitai wo Sutenaide Kudasai! is also the last novel in the series for the moment by the way. It is followed by three short story collections, but I am not sure when I'm going to read those books. Parts of them were already used for the drama adaptation, so I am already familiar with almost half of them. Koko ni Shitai wo Sutenaide Kudasai! for me however was a safe, familiar return to a place I know well. It's perhaps not the best novel in this series (it isn't), but it's a consistent and funny mystery novel that does everything you'd expect from a novel in this series.

Original Japanese title(s): 東川篤哉 『ここに死体を捨てないでください！』

Bad City

「浮気調査も金持ちの夫婦しか引け受けないし、 犬も猫も雑種は探しません。探偵業界のブラック・ジャックと呼ばれています」

「誰に呼ばれているの？」

「基本、私です」

『私の嫌いな探偵』

"I only take adultery cases from rich couples and won't look for crossbred cats or dogs. And that's why I am called the Black Jack of the private eye industry"

"By whom?"

"Mostly me"

"The Detective I Don't Like"

'No, not another Higashigawa Tokuya drama adaptation review', you might think. Sorry, I seldom plan what to read/watch/listen to next, so sometimes I accidently end up with similar reviews close to each other...

Ikagawashi series
Misshitsu no Kagi wo Kashimasu ("Lending the Key of 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")
'Jisoku 40 Kilo no Misshitsu' ("A Locked Room at 40KM/H") in: Shin Honkaku Tokubetsuhen - Fukanou Hanzai no Kyouen.

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

Watashi no Kirai na Tantei ("The Detective I Don't Like") is a TV drama which ran from January to March this year based on Higashigawa Tokuya's Ikagawashi series. Ukai Morio is a private detective who specializes in infidelity cases and locating lost pets, because they make the most money. He finds a cheap spot for his offices in the Ninomiya Building, but soon starts to regret his move: his new landlord, Ninomiya Akemi, is a big detective fiction fan and 'blackmails' Ukai (through the rent) in taking on more difficult (and less profitable) cases like locked room murders and other baffling crimes, just so she can tag along and try a bit of mystery solving herself. And unfortunately for Ukai, and fortunately for Akemi, the town of Ikagawashi is brimming with impossible crimes.

I have been following the Ikagawashi series for some time now, and I quite like how it mixes comedy with orthodox puzzle plots. But I'll be honest, I wasn't really looking forward to this adaptation of the series. Why? Because it was clear from the start that the TV series would feature some drastic changes from the original stories. Most obvious is the upgrade in importance of the character of Ninomiya Akemi. In the original stories, she's Ukai's landlord and basically has to force Ukai in taking on cases, or else he won't be able to pay the rent. She has no interest in the detective business nor detective fiction however, and most of the stories follow the detective Ukai and his disciple Ryuuhei. But because TV dramas absolutely need love interests, and because they had to push actress Gouriki Ayame as the main character, the TV drama version of Ninomiya Akemi becomes a strange amulgation of Ryuuhei from the novels, and the actual person Gouriki Ayame. And as such, she hogs all of the screentime and is the driving force behind all investigations.

So I wasn't sure whether I would like this adaptation of the Ikagawashi series, considering they made someone else the main character. It's like making Miss Lemon the protagonist of a Poirot TV series. Just play with that idea in your mind for a minute.

But because the TV series also adapted stories of the Ikawagashi series I hadn't read yet, I decided to bite the bullet. And it wasn't as messy as I had expected. Don't get me wrong though, the Ninomiya Akemi in the drama is absolutely horrible as a character. She's like a black hole sucking up all the good lines, all the great moments of the stories from the other characters. But ignoring that part (which can be difficult, I admit), Watashi no Kirai na Tantei is a fairly entertaining detective series.

The original stories are a great example of how to mix (sometimes slapstick) humour with puzzle plots: hints are concealed in what seem nothing more than just gags at first sight, and you'll often hit yourself when you realize you let such an obvious hint slide by just because it was presented in a funny way. The TV drama manages to do the same and adds in a lot of its own comedy, most of it in the form of  a good dose of meta-comedy as well as the zany (faulty) deductions made by Akemi. A lot of detective TV dramas are referenced in the course of the show, for example Galileo, Furuhata Ninzaburou, Kindaichi Kousuke, Kindaichi Shounen no Jikenbo and Trick, as well as other Higashigawa Tokuya-based dramas like Nazotoki wa Dinner no Ato de. The many, obviously mistaken deductions remind of that Police Squad! inspired classic, 33pun Tantei ("33 Minutes Detective"), which had the premise of stretching each story out to a full length episode of 33 minutes with crazy deductions, even though they always figured out who it was in the first five minutes. Watashi no Kirai na Tantei is also doing a good job at presenting the craziest deductions: the moment they posed the killer-cat solution for a locked room murder (complete with image), I knew that at least the comedy was good.

The first two episodes are based on the first book in the series, Misshitsu no Kagi wo Kashimasu ("Lending the Key to the Locked Room"), and the seventh episode on Kanzen Hanzai ni wa Neko Nanbiki Hitsuyou Ka? ("How Many Cats Do You Need For a Perfect Crime?"), so refer to those reviews if you want to learn more about them in detail. The remaining five episodes are based on the short stories, of which two I think are the best of the whole TV series.

Episode four, Shi ni Itaru Zenryou Shisshou no Nazo ("The Mystery of Running Into Death") is about an almost grotesque problem: a man is witnessed to run at full speed into a wall, knocking himself out. Does the case have to do with the summoning of UFOs by Akemi? A fantastic premise, and the solution is pretty great too: Higashigawa Tokuya is really at his best when he does these short stories with somewhat plausible, yet somehow strange scenes. Nanatsu no Beer Case no Mondai  ("The Problem of the Seven Beer Cases") on the other hand is a good example of how to tie up all kinds of plotlines together and how to present a somewhat mundane, yet mystifying problem with an almost painfully simple, yet hard to see solution.

 
I would absolutely love this series if not for the shuffle with main characters. In the novel series, the 'detective' archetype (i.e. the person who explains everything at the end) is acually someone different most of the time, sometimes it's Ukai, sometimes it's police detective Sunagawa etcetera, but this is also changed in the TV series, always having Ukai doing most of the deductions, and then Akemi stealing the last good part by deducing something even Ukai overlooked I actually liked how the novels always kept readers on their toes by switching detective roles, so this was another reason I wasn't too big a fan of the character rewrites.

Watashi no Kirai na Tantei is a pretty fun series. The biggest reason behind that is because the original stories are good, but the team also did their best injecting their own comedy in the stories. It's just the sudden rise in importance of one character that kinda makes it hard for me to just recommend it. Of course, if you're a fan of Gouriki Ayame, go for it and I quite liked Tamaki Hiroshi as Ukai, but the main dynamics of this TV series, are quite different from the dynamics you'll find in the original Ikagawashi series.

Original Japanese title(s): 東川篤哉 (原)　『私の嫌いな探偵』

Strangers on a Train

"It's so simple, too. A couple of fellows meet accidentally, like you and me. No connection between them at all. Never saw each other before. Each of them has somebody he'd like to get rid of, but he can't murder the person he wants to get rid of. He'll get caught. So they swap murders."

- "Swap murders?"

"Each fellow does the other fellow's murder. Then there is nothing to connect them. The one who had the motive isn't there. Each fellow murders a total stranger. Like you do my murder and I do yours."

 "Strangers on a Train"

And in other news, it might be interesting to note that my review of Gyakuten Saiban 5 / Phoenix Wright Ace Attorney - Dual Destinies gathered a larger total visitor count than any post here, within a week. Probably says more about my regular visitor count than anything else though. And now for something completely different.

Private detective Ukai Morio and his landlord Akemi are going undercover as butler and maid in a mansion in the mountains near the city of Ikagawashi, because the lady of the house suspects her husband is cheating on her. By going out a night (but leaving her detectives in the mansion), she hopes to be able to find proof of his infidelity. Meanwhile, detective apprentice Ryuuhei is having a dare-we-call-it-a-date? with the wealthy Sakura (whom he met in Misshitsu ni Mukatte Ute!), visiting one of Sakura's friends. Strange happenings happen at both sides of the story though, which seems to be connected to a murder in a less-fortunate part of town. What is going on in Koukan Satsujin ni Mukanai Yoru ("A Bad Night To Exchange Murders")?

Fourth novel in Higashigawa Tokuya's Ikagawashi series and personally, I wasn't too big a fan of it. Sure, there's the zany humour and the multi-perspective storytelling we've all come to love in the series, and it was quite fun to see Sakura again from Misshitsu ni Mukatte Ute!, but overall, the book failed to impress. Might be because I read it closely after Kanzen Hanzai ni Neko wa Nanbiki Hitsuyouka, leading to a Higashigawa overload, but there is another fundamental fault to this story.

I've been writing about detective fiction for some years now, usually by focussing on tropes/conventions. This usually works out well for me: I like writing about tropes like locked room murders, closed circles, nursery rhyme murders or even more specific tropes likes Queen's 'fetish' for objects, or the importance of location in the Tantei Jinguuji Saburou games. What's even more important, I can usually write freely about these topics, because they don't really spoil the book for readers. In fact, there are quite some readers for example who read a book, because they know it's a locked room murder. So I feel no hesitation when I describe these murder scenes, or go indepth about tropes across works and adding a little tag to the post with trope X's name on it.

But then there are some you just can't spoil (or at least, I don't want to spoil). I usually try to avoid mentioning narrative tricks and other surprises for example. It makes it hard to review such books for me, because saying that there's a narrative trick hidden in a story, already spoils the surprise for the reader (even if I don't specify what it exactly is), while I myself do really want to write about these kind of things. Heck, there are actually a lot of books reviewed here which should have a 'narrative trick' tag. There are other examples: sometimes not knowing what's coming, improves the enjoyment of a certain story and then it's better not to touch upon the topic in a review (I really want to discuss the trick of a major Japanese work translated in English two, three years ago, for example, but it would spoil the surprise if I specified which work it is).

And that's the problem I have Koukan Satsujin ni Mukanai Yoru, because I might have found the happenings to be slightly more mysterious and puzzling if the title didn't outright say there was a murder exchange going on. In an inverted mystery, it might be better to know beforehand there's a murder exchange, but when the title talks about exchanging murders, and you're presented two parallel running storylines, well, you can make an educated guess what's going on. I was more surprised at the fact the 'reveal' that there was a murder exchange going on was supposed to be surprising.

There is of course a bit more going on than just a 'simple' murder exchange, but the keyword murder exchange already spoils too much of the story, as even the subsequent reveals seemed, at least in my eyes, not very surprising. The fact that the dead body appears quite late in the narrative is also not beneficial to the enjoyment of the novel, as you already know 1) someone is going to die and 2) there will be a murder exchange just from the title; it shouldn't take hundreds of pages to bring the story to that point.

There is also a second 'trick' hidden within the narrative, but it is executed extremely artificial and unbelievable, it's impossible to enjoy (despite it actually being related to one of my academic interests). Especially after seeing the same trick executed, much, much better in other novels, I can't help but wonder what Higashigawa Tokuya was thinking. He has some great work, like the horrible short story Arima Kinen no Bouken shows, sometimes he has a very, ver bad day.

In conclusion, a disappointing entry in an otherwise fun series. Next up: probably something English!

Original Japanese title(s): 東川篤哉  『交換殺人に向かない夜』

Cat Food

「なに、依頼人を殺されたからといって驚くには値しない。一説によると、探偵というものは、依頼人を殺されてはじめて半人前なのだそうだ。事実、過去の探偵たちも、その多くは事件のさいちゅうに依頼人を殺されている。結構、よくあることなのさ」

 それって探偵たちが殺したんじゃないの？きっと中にはそういう事件もあったはず―と朱美は思ったが、さすがに探偵の前ではいいづらい。代わりに、べつの問題。

「依頼人を殺されて探偵はどうすうの？」

「犯人を挙げて依頼人の無念を晴らす、というのが一般的だん。それでやっと一人前」

『完全犯罪に猫は何匹必要か？』　東川篤哉

"You don't have to act so surprises just because my client was murdered. According to some, having your client killed is an important step to become a real detective. A lot of the famous detectives in the past had their clients murdered. It's actually quite common."

Did he mean the detectives were killing the clients themselves? There were probably such cases, Akemi thought, but she didn't say it out loud in front of a detective. So, a different question.

"So what's a detective with a murdered client going to do?"

"Take revenge instead of my client and find the murderer, is the common way of doing things. Do that, and you'll finally be considered a real detective."

"How Many Cats Do You Need For A Perfect Crime?" (Higashigawa Tokuya)

Writing the Dogura Magura review was definitely more tiring than I had expected. But it's honestly the only way I could think of writing something on it. But because of that, I have a horrible backlog of reviews-to-be-written. Well, at least I don't have to worry about material to post about this month.

Goutokuji Toyozou is the owner of the popular sushi chain Manekizushi and a great cat lover. In fact, Manekizushi's trademark is a grand maneki-neko in front of every restaurant (lovingly called "colomeow Meownders"). But his beloved cat has disappeared, so Goutokuji hires the private detective Ukai Morio to find her. The search for the cat isn't going as smooth like Ukai would have wanted, and the murder on Goutokuji in the glass house in his garden some days later isn't really helping the case either. Why was the murderer wearing a cat mask, why was the gigantic maneki-neko statue moved from the mansion's entrance to the glass house and where is that cat of Goutokuji? In short, like the title Kanzen Hanzai ni Neko wa Nanbiki Hitsuyouka? says: how many cats do you need for a perfect crime?

The third novel of Higashigawa Tokuya's Ikagawashi series, which has become familiar terrain by now. Once again we follow the (mis)adventures of private detective Ukai, Ryuuhei (and the office's landlord Akemi) on one side, and the police represented by inspector Sunagawa and his subordinate Shiki on the other side. Like with Higashigawa's other series (like the Koigakubo Academy Detective Club series and Nazotoki wa Dinner no Ato de), humour plays a large part in these stories. There are a lot of slapstick-funny moments and the whole tone of the book is quite light, but as always the humour shouldn't fool you, because these are all wonderfully constructed Golden Age style detective novels and even the funny moments might contain a crucial hint that leads to the solution of the case.

Like the first novel in the series, Kanzen Hanzai ni Neko wa Nanbiki Hitsuyouka is a bit on the easy side, but the way Higashigawa manages to blend the humour with the proper detective plot is still very enjoyable to see. Part of the humour is derived from mirroring scenes of Ukai and his disciple Ryuuhei, with the events that happen to inspector Sunagawa and Shiki. There is probably an awfully intellectual way to explain how the humour works through the juxtaposition of scenes, but I definitely can't. I just know I like this kind of humour.

The problem of who killed the client, and the mystery behind the moving manekineko is as said a bit easy. The phrase Simpsons did it is strangely enough usable here (no, it's not the Mr. Burns story), but even without having seen it, the hint seems just too... obvious. Especially after the first two novels, the presentation of the main hint seemed a bit crude. There is another murder in the story, of someone at a funeral, and that was much better in terms of tying it up to seemingly meaningless humorous banter. In fact, I very much liked this murder at the funeral (not to be confused with Christie's After the Funeral).

The cat-theme did bring up memories of a discussion I was once present at on so-called cat-mysteries. When is it appropiate to call something a cat-mystery (or more broadly; an animal mystery)? Kanzen Hanzai ni Neko wa Nanbiki Hitsuyouka for example does feature a lot of cat themes, like the manekineko, the murderer's cat mask and the search for the missing cat, but some might argue for fiction where cats themselves play an active role in the case. A series like Akagawa Jirou's Mikeneko Holmes can thus be considered the cat-mystery, but one could also consider a cat leading detectives to clues / murderers to be a bit unrealistic. And I guess that Morikawa Tomoki's Cat Food (with magical cats) is also out of the questions. And if we are only looking at mystery fiction where animals act...well, you'd expect the animal in question to behave, would it be possible to consider Gyakuten Saiban / Phoenix Wright Ace Attorney a parrot mystery?

And yes, this was not that interesting a review.  It's relatively easy to write about a really good, or bad book, but filling a post on something slightly beneath average - average - slightly above average is surprisingly difficult.

Original Japanese title(s): 東川篤哉 『完全犯罪に猫は何匹必要か？』

「この世にもしも傘がたった一つだとしても探してキミに渡すよ」

「密室の結論が自殺だそうだ。おれが読者なら本は二つになってるぞ」

幸いなことに、砂川警部は読者ではなく登場人物である。

『密室に向かって撃て！』

"So your conclusion to the locked room is suicide. If I were a reader, the book would have been ripped in two"

Inspector Sunagawa is luckily not a reader, but a character within the story

"Shoot Towards the Locked Room!"

I had originally planned to post this review after Kanou Tomoko's Nanatsu no Ko. The sudden insertion of the Short Short yesterday however, rendered the introduction I had written initially totally unusable. Why change the order? Because I didn't want to stop the posting cycle with a Short Short. Why I don't spread the few posts I do write a month more evenly instead of focusing it all on a couple of days? Because that would make sense.

Misshitsu ni Mukatte Ute! ("Shoot Towards the Locked Room!") is the second volume in Higashigawa Tokuya's Ikagawashi series, a set of stories set in the fictional town of Ikagawashi. It is a direct sequel to the first volume, with all the major characters appearing again. We are first re-introduced to the (mostly) bumbling police inspectors Sunagawa and Shiki, who surprisingly, or as expected, make a big mistake during an attempt to arrest a wanted man. The result: a dead suspect and someone making off with an illegally manufactured pistol loaded with an unknown amount of bullets. A couple of weeks after the incident, the body of a homeless man is found shot through the chest, followed by another big incident at the mansion of the wealthy Juujouji family, with two injured men, one death and the recovery of the pistol. But where did the mysterious assailant disappear to? The only access (and escape route) to the murder scene, a mansion annex built on top of a cliff overlooking the sea, was observed by several witnesses, so the only conclusion is that the murderer must have thrown himself off the cliff into the sea. Or did he? 'Great detective' Ukai and his 'disciple' Ryuuhei have a personal stake in this case and are determined to find out the truth behind the disappearing murderer.

By now I've written quite often about Higashigawa Tokuya's works, so I'll just keep to the short description this time: he writes orthodox comedy detectives. The afterword in my pocket edition written by Sengai Akiyuki describes Higashigawa Tokuya's works as addictive, in the sense that they become funnier/better/harder to resist the more you read them. Which is definitely the case with me. Misshitsu ni Mukatte Ute! works as a comedy detective novel because it builds on the great parts of Misshitsu no Kagi Kashimasu, with great banter between the two duos of Ukai/Ryuuhei and Sunagawa/Shiki and slapstick comedy scenes. The book is probably not nearly as funny without any knowledge of the first novel. That certainly creates a small barrier, but hey, the first novel was fun too, so why wouldn't you read it? In fact, much of the comedy of Higashigawa Tokuya's novels depend on running jokes, so it shouldn't surprise that these jokes also run over several novels.

But Higashigawa would certainly not have been this popular if his only talent would have been to write funny stories. As always, his comedy is partly a devious way to hide his hints to the solution, luring the reader in a false sense of security. Heck, even running jokes are not safe and when you finally realize that a running joke was actually a significant hint thrown at you time after time, well, that hurts. In a good way. This time, Higashigawa also created an interesting non-linear, multi-route deduction map. And I apologize to those who don't understand videogames lingo. Anyway, at the end of the story, we see two different characters following up two different lines of deductions to arrive at the same murderer. While the two deductions are imperfect on their own (so you really need to have read both deductions to understand everything), it is still a refreshing way to look at the case, as both routes do lead to the correct murderer.

An interesting point of this novel was the whole disappearing pistol problem. Higashigawa not only came up with an explanation for the murderer actually having a gun in a country where it is difficult to procure a gun (which is the way it should be anyway...), he also follows up this explanation to its logical consequences. A limited amount of bullets, no use of silencers, experience in handling guns, the fact that the murder weapon is an illegally manufactured gun comes back in several ways in the deductions that lead up to the conclusion and this was really well done by Higashigawa, I think.

Interesting was also the way Higashigawa changed the setting of this novel, compared to Misshitsu no Kagi Kashimasu. The latter was clearly urban, while Misshitsu ni Mukatte Ute! is set in a big Western mansion on top of a cliff. So what did Higashigawa do? He went down the Yokomizo Seishi-route. We don't have ancient spirits of warriors cutting down people, but we do have a trio of wealthy and influential candidate fiances vying for the hand of Juujouji Sakura, the heiress of the Juujouji family (Yes, it's Jououbachi I'm thinking about). Actually, the way Ukai manages to be at the scene during the times the shooting incident happens also seems inspired by Yokomizo Seishi, with Kindaichi Kousuke often coming across murder cases while he is hired for different (less bloody) investigations. It was a funny change of tone, especially as I was so enthusiastic about the urban setting of Misshitsu no Kagi Kashimasu.

And it took me almost a month to finish this book, despite me obviously having fun with it. Why? No idea. I only know it took me two days to read the first 150 pages, afterwards I fell into a slow, slow schedule of reading two or three pages every two days or so for three weeks. And then I decided I really should finish the book last night. I hope my next book won't take this long.

Original Japanese title(s): 東川篤哉　『密室に向かって撃て！』

「Welcome Trouble」

「にもかかわらず、この薄汚れたアパートの名前は白波荘という。建物は古くなっても名前は古くならないので、このようなアンバランスな現象がおこるわけだ」

『密室の鍵貸します』

"Despite that, this shabby apartment was called the White Wave mansion. These kinds of unbalances happen because even though buildings get older, names don't."

"Lending the Key to the Locked Room"

For those interested, the new look is borrowed stolen from Famicom Tantei Club. To be exact, the title screen of the first game. Random info: Sakamoto Yoshio wrote the complete script of the first game in only three days. Why I changed the look? Because I've been paying too much attention to retro games lately. And as university starts again, I'm pretty sure I'll drop back to the more sane posting schedule of once or twice a week. Instead of twenty posts a month. What the... ?!

And now on to the main course, which is Higashigawa Tokuya's Misshitsu no Kagi Kashimasu ("Lending the Key to the Locked Room"). This is Higashigawa's first full-length novel, as well as the first novel in his Ikagawashi series, a set of orthodox detective stories set in the fictional town of Ikagawashi. In fact, the first Higashigawa story I read, the short story A Locked Room at 40 KM/H, is also part of the same Ikagawashi series. There is no real main detective for this series (changing from book to book), though the private detective Ukai Morio and police inspector Sunagawa appear the most prominent in the Ikagawashi novels. The other characteristic of this series is the humorous tone of the stories, with almost slapstick-esque situations and witty conversations. But like Arisugawa Alice says in the commentary to Misshitsu no Kagi Kashimasu: the books are funny, but this humorous tone might also be a trap...

Because beneath the humor and all, there is a 'normal' detective plot. Misshitsu no Kagi Kashimasu starts with an interesting problem for the young student Ryuuhei. Things have not been easy for him, having to give up his dream as a film director and settling with a naitei (a pre-approval for a job) for a company that makes documentaries. Which in turn led into him being dumped by his girlfriend. Which is bad enough, but not as bad as that night. The night his ex-girlfriend was stabbed and pushed from her balcony. Which isn't even the worst part. Not even the fact that some time earlier, Ryuuhei, in a rather drunken state (he doesn't remember anything of it though), had yelled he would kill her in front of a lot of witnesses. No, the worst part is that the only person who can prove Ryuuhei's alibi, his university senior, was also stabbed to death. In his bathroom. In a locked apartment. And the only other person inside the apartment at that time was... Ryuuhei. Because he lost conciousness when he found the dead body of his senior and didn't wake up until the morning, Ryuuhei panicks. No way the police is going to believe he has nothing to do with either case. So Ryuuhei flees the crime scene and asks for help to his ex-brother-in-law, the private detective Ukai Morio. Who is nice enough to help him.

The novel is told from both Ryuuhei's perspective as well as that of the police, which makes for a very entertaining story. Ryuuhei is of course on the run, while the police is looking for him, so the points where these storylines intersect are really funny to read, as you see the same situation from two different perspectives (at one points, Ryuuhei is nearly run over by the police). But that is just one aspect of the humor, as Higashigawa is quite a funny writer, coming up with funny conversations and witty remarks. At times, the novel feels like a parody of the genre, but whatever it is, it's funny.

But like Arisugawa said, don't underestimate the book just because it's funny. For this is a genuine detective and quite an entertaining one too. The problem of the locked room is done quite good, even if the fundamental trick is quite basic. It is however very well adapted for the modern, urban setting of this novel. In fact, the urban setting and the humor reminds me a lot of Arisugawa Alice's Writer Alice series. Which is hardly a bad thing. I like Nikaidou Reito's novels, but his books are so often set in castles and old mansions, which feels a bit artificial. Given the choice, I do prefer the more urban settings found in Arisugawa Alice and Norizuki Rintarou novels.

Misshitsu no Kagi Kashimasu, as a locked room mystery, is not surprising like a Nikaidou Reito mystery, but it is constructed quite well and Higashigawa's writing style really adds something to the story. Misshitsu no Kagi Kashimasu is a detective novel that anyone could enjoy, I think. Like the books by Higashino Keigo, it's one of those books that are a lot easier to recommend to people who usually don't read the genre. A funny novel with a satisfying plot-structure that is sure to entertain the reader.

Original Japanese title(s): 東川篤哉　 『密室の鍵貸します』