In Search of the Black Rose

With bony hands I hold my partner, 

on soulless feet we cross the floor

"Grim Fandango" 

Phew, was I glad to hear this was getting a normal re-release, because all those facsimile re-releases are rather pricey... 

Aku Naoto is an amateur detective who's friends with Saikawa Shinji, a cameraman who works for a local television station. He's usually teamed up with director Gamou Takumi, who loves the occult and often creates original programs where they investigated haunted houses and other cursed locations, much to the horror of Saikawa, as he really doesn't like ghosts. When he and Gamou recently went location scouting and stayed for the night at a haunted place, Saikawa swears a ghost tried to strangle him, making him even more reluctant to do these kinds of jobs. That is why he has asked Aku to come along as his "assistant cameraman" on the next job. Their next job is at the Curious Crooked Castle, a Japanese-style castle that stands crooked and which until a few years ago was open to the public as a kind of amusement park/wunderkammer, but after a mysterious suicide happening in one of the rooms, it has remained closed. The room where the suicide happened, with creepy paintings hanging from the wall, is rumored to be haunted by the ghost of a fallen soldier. Director Gamou is to stay a night in the room to see if there's a ghost there, but Saikawa is afraid Gamou will ask him to stay in the room too, so Aku's supposed to take his place if that were too happen. They have already made all the arrangements for the shoot with Houjou, the owner of the house, who happens to be the uncle of one of the writers on the team, who are all coming along too. Another important member of the team is Kuro, a beautiful high school student who dresses completely in black. She has psychic powers and she's to act as the spirit medium to detect if there's anything supernatural going on in the Crooked Castle. Oddly, the very first thing she says to Aku is: "Do you like scissors?"

After the crew's arrival, Houjou and his secretary show the crew the castle, which has four "exhibition" rooms, which feature paintings, but also a collection of curiosities like a mannequin which might or might not feature real human hair and also a basement with a dried-up well. The team prepares for the midnight shooting of the stay in the suicide room, but there's still quite some time, so everybody goes about their own business, until they realize Gamou's been gone for a while, even though he was just supposed to check out the suicide room. They find the room bolted from the inside and there's no reply coming from inside. Houjou's secretary brings out her beloved chainsaw to break the door open, and inside they find... a decapitated Houjou. A storm prevents the police from arriving at the scene, but Aku quickly deduces who the culprit is anyway, but why would that person want to kill Gamou? That is the great mystery in Asukabe Katsunori's Kuro to Ai ("Black & Love, 2010).

By now it should be a familiar story, as I have repeated a few times over the last two years. Asukabe Katsunori was an author who was mostly active in the first decade of the 2000s, but after that first period, the books stopped coming, and with that, his earlier books also became difficult to obtain, slowly earning him the status of a cult author. However, a few years ago, bookshops Shosen and Horindo started putting out limited facsimile releases of his out-of-print works and the facsimile release Datenshi Goumonkei ("Torture of the Fallen Angels" 2008) in particular was a notable event, gathering a lot of attention. Since then, publishers have been re-releasing a lot of Asukabe's books from their catalogues that had previously been out-of-print for over a decade, like Lamia Gyakusatsu ("Lamia Massacre"). Leonardo no Chinmoku and today's book, which got a new re-release in 2026, sixteen years after its original release. Renewed awareness of his work has also led to Asukabe's return to writing and he has published at least two new books in 2025 and 2026 by the time this review is posted.

Interestingly, the murder mystery I described above only makes up half of the narrative of Kuro to Ai. The decapitation murder in the locked room in the castle takes up a bit more than the first fifth of the entire novel, which ends with Aku announcing they've solved the murder. The book however then jumps back in time and focuses on... the killer. The story is told from their perspective and set several months before the murder. The culprit turns out to be working at a school library, with the television writing being a side job, and it is at this school the culprit first encounters Kuro: she transferred a while ago to this school and stands out not only because of her beauty, but also because she doesn't wear the school uniform, but a black uniform, which is supposedly from her previous school. The question "Do you like scissors?" is asked to the killer too, who is immediately smitten by Kuro's mysterious attitude. They very quickly become completely obsessed with Kuro, following her after school to her home and wanting Kuro all for themselves, becoming jealous everytime they see Kuro interacting with two friends. Kuro seems to have developed some kind of liking to the librarian too and even invites them to her "death birthday", but when one of Kuro's friends says Kuro shouldn't, the killer becomes nearly insane, ready to kill that friend right there for interfering with their and Kuro's relation. The obsession becomes worse and worse as the killer sneaks into Kuro's house and discovers a horrible secret Kuro and her two friends have been hiding in a refrigerator there. However, nothing the killer does to attract Kuro's attention works out as planned and slowly but surely, things develop in a way that makes murder the only solution...

This obsession with a beautiful young woman/teenager is definitely a huge part of Asukabe's novels by the way, being a recurring theme in several of his works. These women are usually independent, enigmatic and also have an element of weakness, attracting the attention of men their own age as well of those well above theirs, who want to "protect" the woman and have her alone for themselves. Of the Asukabe's works I've read until now, I think he managed to portray this obsession the best in this book, as so much of the narrative is dedicated to such an obsessed mind: in other books, we often follow a character who is also interested in the girl, but doesn't become as obssessed at the one here, and we usually also have more things to think about while reading those narratives, while here we have a whole part dedicated just to this obsession.

Anyway, the account leading up to the murder is not really a mystery per se (even if it has a few unexplained parts that involve a mystery), though it will plant some clues necessary for the solution of the locked room murder in the castle. What this part is, however, is a truly creepy account of someone who is soon revealed to be a bit unstable at the very least, and who completely loses it once they become enthralled by Kuro, wanting her for themselves and obsessing every single secound about her. The portrayal of this obsession is genuinely unsettling, and can feel both unrealistic and realistic at the same time: it's weird how quickly the killer becomes obsessed with Kuro and how everything starts to revolve around how to improve their link to Kuro, culminating into the murder on Gamou, but at the same time, you probably have to be at least a little bit insane to become an obsessive stalker. This account is definitely the highlight of the book by the way: not that the actual murder in the castle is bad, but the way we see the killer go down the path of insanity is absolutely captivating, not in the least because the object of their obsession, Kuro, is such a mysterious figure, someone who is always dressed in black, asks people whether they like scissors, who celebrates her "death" birthday. The way the account includes foreshadowing/hints that help build up the story's finale is great too, for example when the killer learns about an impossible disappearance from a basement cell in the Curious Crooked Castle. 

After this examination of the killer, the narrative jumps back to the present, where we learn Aku has already finished explaining exactly how the killer managed to decapitate Gamou in a locked room and how that method allowed them to identify the killer, who has been put in a cell in the basement until the police arrives. Things however escalate from this point on: more characters present in the castle are revealed to have hidden agendas which they hope to execute before the police arrive, while Aku's solution is also shown to not be completely right, leading to more twists and turns awaiting in the last third of the novel. The reader who has read more of Asukabe's work might not be surprised by now, but the climax does become fantasy/science-fiction-esque at times, though I guess you could squint your eyes and handwave those parts away as "it was meant metaphorically", though going by Asukabe's other books, it's definitely meant to be fantasy. Your mileage might vary on how well you'll like this part of the book: I have to say I'm not a very big fan of it in general, but by now I've learned to accept it as a part of Asukabe's work. One of the characters in Kuro to Ai is also heavily hinted to be the same character from another novel by Asukabe by the way, but revealing the exact character would probably be spoilers, especially considering what they do here...

Anyway, as for the actual murder mystery, I am not really a huge fan of the actual mechanics of the locked room murder: the trick is acceptable, but it's simply of the type I don't really like. What works better is how this trick is then used to utilize the Queen deduction method of elimination to identify the culprit: Asukabe does here that could almost feel like cheating, but I think he did a great job at setting the twist up with proper clewing, and it's an interesting way to play with the elimination method of deduction. The clues hidden in the killer's account turn out to be quite well-placed, challenging you to identify mirroring elements in both the past and present narratives even if they apply to different situations. The base concept is not something that is very surprising, perhaps, but Asukabe's execution is done really well. There is a secondary mystery about two impossible disappearances from a locked cell in the basement of the castle, and the solution here is horrible. I mean that mostly in the sense of "the idea of that happening is just terrifying", though the actual solution itself is also rather ridiculous. Its sillyness only works here because by then, the book starts to show omens of the fantasy/science-fiction-esque climax.

Kuro to Ai is definitely one of the strongest Asukabes I've read until now, and certainly stronger as a mystery novel, and as a "horror" novel, compared to the two books by him I reviewed before this one. The book presents an alright locked room murder mystery, but it's definitely the look into the killer's obsessed mind that makes this book a great read, especially once you realize how it all also connects to the actual mystery later on. His first novel, Junkyou Catherine Sharin ("The Martyrdom of Saint Catherine's Wheel" AKA The Martyrdom of Saint Catherine.) is still relatively "normal", so in terms of length and contents, I think Kuro to Ai might be the most accessible work by Asukabe that gives the reader a good idea of what he does best: other books tend to be much longer or otherwise less well developed as this one. 

Original Japanese title(s): 飛鳥部勝則『黒と愛』 

Trace Memory

ひとつの目で明日をみて

ひとつの目で昨日を見つめてる

「The Real Folk Blues」（山根麻衣）

 

With one eye I look at tomorrow 

With one eye I keep staring at yesterday 

 "The Real Folk Blues" (Yamane Mai)

Oh, this reminds me I never finished the Another Code R part of the Another Code Recollection. I loved the Wii original though...

"O" was a serial killer who specialized in murdering people in locked rooms: he was also extremely good at that, as he had nearly killed a hundred people during his career. He made a mistake however when he killed Professor Kiryuu, but left his child alive: the young Kiryuu Touma swore revenge, becoming a detective specializing in O's handiwork. Because Touma remains in the shadows as a detective, the public soon came up with the name "Phantom Alpha". And it was Phantom Alpha who eventually managed to capture "O", just as he killed his 96th victim. "O" turned out to be a man called Migiwazaki Hitoshi and he was soon detained, but not at a prison: he was sent to the laboratory of Kuzumi Chiyo, a former pupil of Professor Kiryuu and a personal friend of Phantom Alpha. Chiyo runs the Kuzumi Brain Laboratory on Akon Island, a remote and highly secured island. Here Chiyo's researching memories, with her end goal being the Pandora Brain, a device that can extract memories of one person and implant them into another person, effectively overwriting one person's identity over another. Because the police can't find proof/explanations for all of the locked room murders O committed, Chiyo and her team of a handful of researchers are to examine Migiwazaki's memories and extract that information about all the crimes he committed from his brain. Migiwazaki is of course held in a heavily secured room, with pressure and biometric sensors making sure he's kept safely inside his prison cell day and night. Phantom Alpha (Touma) visits the island too to witness the experiment. The two nemeses "O" and "Phantom Alpha" have a confrontation over a video connection, but then there's a short power failure. Chiyo has the main computer (on the back-up generator) restore power in the facility, but when the security cameras go on again, they see Migiwazaki's burnt body in his prison cell. Touma hurries to the cell, which was locked throughout the power failure, but there's no doubt there's a burnt body there. But how could anyone have killed "O" like that in a locked room...?

Three years later, a group of university students make their way to the island to stay at the remains of the Kuzumi Brain Laboratory. Three years ago, an incident happened on the island, with four people being found murdered at the lab, including Migiwazaki, and two people (including Touma), missing from the island. There also had been a fire, which burnt down part of the building. The students belong to their university's Mystery Club and managed to arrange to stay for a few nights in the lab with the current owner of the property. As fans of the mystery genre, they are of course excited to stay at an island where such a mysterious incident occured just three years ago, but then murders start to happen here too and they start thinking: what if that Pandora Brain device that was being developed here was in a working state, and what if Migiwazaki's identity survived the murder spree and fire...? Minami Asov's Pandora Brain - Akontou Satsujin(kaku) Jiken ("Pandora Brain - The Akon Island (Identity) Murder Case", 2025) follows mysteries set both in the past and the present as they slowly converge towards one truth.

Minami Asov's first mystery novel Eigoukan Chourenzoku Satsujn Jiken - Majo wa X to Shinu Koto ni Shita ("The Super Serial Murder Case at the House of Eternity - The Witch Chose To Die With X"), released in 2024, was a mystery novel that cleverly used the supernatural device of time travel to bring a complex, but highly enjoyable plot. It was thus not very surprising to learn Minami's second mystery novel too would utilize some kind of supernatural or science-fiction device. Whereas Eigoukan featured in a historical setting, Pandora Brain is most definitely set in contemporary times (with the mystery club students making a lot of references to mystery fiction) and again, unsurprisingly, we thus get a science-fiction device in the form of the titular Pandora Brain, a device that can supposedly copy a person's whole memories (thus their identity) and implant them into a different person, effectively erasing the original persons's identity and overwriting them.

Which is a cool idea on paper, but I have to admit that for a large part of the story, Pandora Brain doesn't spend a lot of time on said device. The story alternates between the past and present narratives, so we follow both Phantom Alpha/Touma and Chiyo as they deal with the mysterious death of "O" in the prison in the high-tech lab and the students as they stay in the ruins of the lab and they get killed one by one. This means the mystery focuses more on the how and why of the locked room murders, rather than focusing on shenanigans with identity copiers. This is a bit of a disappointment, as you also know the device will become relevant later on, but because the plot only starts to pay attention to the titular Pandora Brain relatively late, most of the reveals surrounding this feel a bit underwhelming, as they don't go far as might have been possible, had it been put front and center from the start, rather than in the last third/quarter of the book. What also doesn't help is that the exact workings of the Pandora Brain aren't explained in enough detail, which means some of the things we learn in the conclusion regarding whether the Pandora Brain had been used in these murders or not, feel a bit unfair: some things are more-or-less handwaved, with the reader just being told it can do certain things or how it can't do certain things, which are relevant to the mystery solving, but we weren't really told about these rules until the denouement!

There are more moments where the book showcases good ideas for a mystery, but where the clewing feels insufficient. The direct trick behind the locked cell murder on "O" is fairly simple, but the underlying idea of how it was brought forth is interesting, but feels unfair because again "this is how a certain thing works" isn't explained properly until the explanation. The same for another murder that happens in the past. Again, the direct trick is simple, but the trick can only be done via a principle that is quite interesting on its own and is basically similar to the underlying principle of the "O" murder, but here too the lack of prior explanation hurts the execution. In the present, I think the set-up of the locked room is decent enough, though I think it would've worked better in a visual format, rather than prose. It is at the very end when the plot tightly connects the narratives of the past and present together, explaining why murders happened on the island three years apart, but it's here where the insufficient prior explanation of "the rules" hurt the story, as the idea is interesting, but we are shown various instances of the rules being applied differently, which makes things feel unfair, even though this could have been avoided by giving us more explanation about the rules (and explanations how/when things work differently from the standard application). The ending is bitter-sweet and again, I do think the general ideas in this novel are good, but I found the execution not nearly as neat as Eigoukan.

So on the whole, I didn't like Pandora Brain as much as Eigoukan. It has cool ideas, and I think a lot of readers will like the banter of the characters (especially in the present, with the students), but as a fair-play mystery, I think it could've been better, even if it's far from bad: I just think there was not only the potential for something much more impressive, so much of it was just in reach, so that makes it feel even more disappointing. Still, Pandora Brain isn't a book I would tell you to avoid, as there's plenty of good to be found inside too.

Original Japanese title(s): 南海遊『パンドラ・ブレイン　亜魂島殺人（格）事件』 

The Secret of Terror Castle

The good king had died

And no one could decide

Who was rightful heir to the throne

"The Sword in the Stone" (Fred Darian) 

No cover art yet, so I'll just use the cover of the magazine with the first installment... 

As Luza wakes up, he still has vague memories of leaving home with his friends in search of the legendary Sea at the End of the World, but their trip soon ended in a disaster. The last thing he recalls is him facing certain death, which is Luza is so surprised to find him in the care of a young man called Romelia, who is very, very interested in Luza. For Luza is someone who shouldn't exist. It turns out an unconscious Luza was found by Romelia, who took him to his home in the Castle of Stone Spheres, where the last humans reside after a natural catastrophy wiped out civilization. While some of the previous society's knowledge still survives via books, technological advancements have been basically reset and the very small enclave of surviving humans now live in a walled village, which is collectively called the Castle of Stone Spheres, named after the enigmatic stone spheres that are scattered all around the castle. Romelia explains that for centuries, it has been believed that the Castle of Stone Spheres is all there is still to the world: the Castle of Stone Spheres is surrounded by total darkness and outside the castle walls is just ground that stretches into emptiness. All the food and other supplies the people consume has to be produced within the castle walls, which is why the community of the Castle of Stone Spheres is strictly regulated by the Nine Kings of the Night, who make sure the community is self-sustainable. Thirteen towers are embedded within the castle walls, each guarded by a priestess. All the towers contain a Crystal Skull, a mysterious device which can generate energy to light up the Castle of Stone Spheres. 

And that is why Luza is an impossibility: there's nothing outside the Castle of Stone Spheres, and yet Luza is not an inhabitant of the castle, meaning he is an outsider and came from beyond the castle walls. There has been no record of an outsider arriving in over two-hundred years of history. However, Luza is lucky Romelia found him, as Romelia does think there's something out there. His father, who studied the now extinct society, once ventured outside the castle walls to find what was waiting there, and while he died during his quest, Romelia still believes his father was right. Romelia decides to introduce Luza to one of the priestesses to see if they can help Luza get back, but they find her murdered inside her own tower, which they found locked from the inside. What's even more surprising is that the priestess had been decapitated! The Kings of the Night have the death of the priestess investigated, as each and every priestess is vital for keeping the castle running. Romelia however desperately tries to keep Luza's existence a secret to the Kings, as they are very swift to deal with anything that might endanger the equilibrium within the Castle. But Romelia and Luza soon realize it wasn't just one murder: one by one, the priestesses are killed in their own towers, each time found in a locked room. It's a race against the clock as Romelia and Luza try to apprehend the murderer and solve both the murders and the mystery behind the Clock of Stone Spheres in Kitayama Takekuni's 2026 novel "Sekikyuujou" Satsujin Jiken ("'The Stone Sphere Castle' Murder Case").

Wa-wait? Is this a brand-new entry in Kitayama Takekuni's Castle series? Why yes! Kitayama made his debut as a mystery writer in 2002 with  'Clock Jou' Satsujin Jiken ("The Clock Castle Murder Case"), which would be the first in a series of four novels, and with (at least) two novels that are somewhat related to this series (Alphabet-sou Jiken AKA The Case of Alphabet and Gettoukan Satsujin Jiken/The Moonlight Manor Murder Case). While the books in this series are standalone and not directly connected to each other story-wise, they all feature unique, fantasy-like worlds with some supernatural elements, with the main connecting tissue being that they all feature castles or grand manors as their main decor. There are some small references shared between the books, but nothing major. For example, a legend involving six decapitated knights and the name Geoffroy is featured in several books, though they do not per se refer to the exact same things. The major similarities between the stories are the castle settings, fantasy/science-fiction elements playing a role in the background, and perhaps the most important aspect: there is an emphasis on impossible murders (often featuring some grand mechanical trick behind them). In fact, Kitayama is known for his locked room murder situations with technical tricks because of this series and 'mechanical tricks' are basically what everyone associates him with. 

Anyway, Kitayama decided to return to his legendary series after two decades and so "Sekikyuujou" Satsujin Jiken was serialized across four installments in the magazine Mephisto between 2025-2026, with the actual book release scheduled for this June. And what a return it is! This is an immensely dense adventure, even by Kitayama standards. The reader is made aware fairly early on that there are thirteen priestesses in as many castle towers and that the murderer is killing and decapitating them one by one in locked rooms, so you start to think: "No way, he can't be serious...", but yes, the madman comes up with over a dozen of impossible crimes in this book! 

But more about that later. For first, I want to highlight the setting. The titular Castle of Stone Spheres is a very unique location, even within the series, as it's both a castle and a (walled) town: it's fairly open compared to previous castle because of that. But what still gives this book a claustrophobic atmosphere is the knowledge the Castle is all there is in the world; for some reason, the world within the castle walls is all that's been left after a catastrophe wiped out basically all of human civilization, and the community surviving in the castle has to be strictly administered to make sure it remains self-sustainable, as that's the only choice they have. Luza and the reader learn from Romelia however that there might be more to the history of the castle and the non-existing world outside, adding a grander, existential mystery on top of the more "mundane" locked room murders. There is also the mystery of the castle itself, which has existed for centuries and which for some reason, has stone spheres lying all around: the enigmatic stone balls vary in size and weight and can be found everywhere, from the town square to inside the priestesses' towers. They seem to be plazed haphazardly and nobody knows what their function is, and in fact, some even swear the spheres sometimes move about, as if they have their own will. These are all elements that tie in to the grand mystery Romelia tries to solve about the castle.

While Luza and Romelia try to save the priestesses, they find their quest hindered by the Nine Kings of the Night, who despise all those who threaten the balance within the Castle of Stone Spheres, which includes the free mind Romelia, and of course the outsider Luza. Romelia and Luza in particular find themselves targeted by Micthran, the King of Death, who seems to have an agenda of his own. He seems to know much more about the castle than anyone else, and it's this storyline that addresses the meta-mystery of the Castle of Stone Spheres. The climax of the clash between Romelia, Luza and Micthran is absolutely fantastic, with a shocking and insanely amusing truth awaiting the reader at the end. I'm not sure things work exactly as it's presented here, but the idea itself is just soooooo deliciously fun and yet simple to imagine, and I have to hand it to Kitayama, he actually had a looot of foreshadowing built into the story that points beautifully to this conclusion. It's this 'grand story' that will likely impress most readers of this book. 

Almost immediately after Luza's arrival in the castle, they realize there's a murderer on the loose who is after the priestesses and their heads, and for some reason the murderer is very, very focused on committing these crimes in locked-room situations. The victims are all discovered in their respective towers, but the exact situations are very different: in one, the impossibility comes from one of the big stone spheres being used to block the door from the inside (meaning the murderer couldn't have left the room after moving the sphere there), in another a priestess is found dead in a room even though Luza had been standing guard near the door, while another situation might involve an impossibility because the room itself couldn't be reached. With over a dozen of locked-room murders, it's no surprise the featured set-ups or solutions aren't all equally memorable or impressive, and while this is no short book, sometimes we do spend awfully little time at one crime scene before moving to the next already. That said, on the whole, Kitayama managed to come up a very entertaining novel and there are some really cool ideas going in some of the locked rooms. Some rooms for example may feature a rather simple trick when taken in isolation, but then Kitayama creates synergy with other locked rooms by cleverly transforming concepts used in one room and applying them to a different one. The use of one particular object in several locked rooms for example is quite memorable. Other locked rooms rely on very specific mechanical tricks that seem a bit gimmicky in a vacuum, though I do think it works narratively, because of something I will explain further below. The stone spheres also play a cool role in setting-up the locked rooms, like having a stone sphere blocking the door in one crime scene, or their presence being used to deny certain theories. The stone spheres are not always super present in the story, but when they pop up, they always make an impression because they end up either negating hypotheses or vice-versa, seem to be involved in the actual solution. The reason why the castle features so many of them in the first place is also addressed at some point, and it's a really clever idea too.

But what Kitayama really does well is taking the whole series of locked-room murders as... well, a series. The locked rooms are not discrete cases, but Kitayama develops them as a sequence, with the complete case taking on a surprising form when viewed in its totality. The way Kitayama does this and ties this analysis to the murderer is both original and a bit insane, in the good sense of the word. Some really clever clewing regarding the identity of the murder is conceiled within the execution of each locked room, giving functional meaning to the fact Kitayama used so many locked rooms in the story, beyond just the notion that having so many of them is fun. The Ellery Queen-like build-up of gathering the clues to identify the murderer is done in a very devious manner in this novel, and Kitayama is sure to use the unusual setting of the Castle of Stone Spheres in its fullest. Kitayama also goes absolutely nuts with diagrams in this book! Basically all the crime scenes are accompanied by a small diagram of the crime scene, so you already have seen plenty of them by the time you arrive at the the final chapter. And there the reader is treated to an absolutely epic summation of all the locked room murders that went on in this book, which of course is accompanied by again more than a dozen of diagrams! I honestly can't remember a mystery novel ever featuring so many diagrams.

So yes, I enjoyed "Sekikyuujou" Satsujin Jiken a lot. It's a very worthy entry to the series. I do think the previous books each had a more memorable major "key" moment that was absolutely insane, from the reason why people were getting decapitated in Clock House to the reveal of the identity of the killer in Alice Castle or simply the presentation of certain locked room murders: in "Sekikyuujou" Satsujin Jiken however does something what I haven't seen Kitayama do before, by utilizing the idea of a series of locked room murders with actual meaning in a novel, and I think the book does show Kitayama's growth as a writer across two decades because it's a very consistent mystery novel throughout, with no real lows and it's entertaining from start to finish. Definitely one of the must-reads of this year!

Original Japanese title(s):  北山猛邦『「石球城」殺人事件』

The Men Without Faces

"Sushi, kamikaze, fujiyama, nipponichi.."

"Mike Tyson's Punch-Out!!" 

Yep, two Conan reviews in succession!

Earlier this week, I reviewed the newest Detective Conan film Fallen Angel of the Highway. The Detective Conan films always release in the second/third week of April, just before the holiday season Golden Week starts there, making it an annual event. Which is why the publisher also times the release of a new volume of the comic in the same week the manga releases, and author Aoyama Goushou also tries to include stories with the main characters of that year's film in that volume. This all requires some timing with serialization and book releases, which is why... apparently it's been a YEAR since the last Detective Conan volume was released. Of course, the times we had a new volume every three, four months are long gone, but I had completely forgotten the most recent volume until last week had in fact been volume 107, which was released along-side the April 2025 film One-Eyed Flashback. Fortunately, volume 107 didn't end with half-way a case, so Detective Conan 108 opens with a brand-new story: An Encounter With the Past. Conan and the Detective Boys run into FBI agent Andre Camel, who after the events of volume 100 was forced to change his identity.  The man now known as "Andou Rekiya" jogs frequently, and just as he and the children are talking, they hear a shot from a nearby apartment building, followed by a knife thrown out of a window. They all hurry to the flat in question, where they find a man already knocking on the door. However, there's no answer and they eventually have to find the landlord to open the door for them. Inside they find the inhabitant of the flat dead, having apparently shot herself through the head with a pistol. It appears she had relations with three male hosts, who had all been called to her flat at that time. At first sight, it appears the woman committed suicide and wanted to have that image haunt the three men in her life, but Conan and Camel soon find indications that suggest the woman had hit her head fatally first, and that the gunshot was used to mask her wound. Furthermore, sushi chef Wakita appears with a sushi delivery made for two persons, suggesting the victim had in fact only invited one of her male friends here, who would be the likely suspect for the murder. But if it was murder, what about the gunshot Conan and the children heard and the knife being thrown out of the flat which was locked from the inside?

This is a pretty run-of-the-mill impossible crime in Detective Conan, where author Aoyama strings a few simple tricks together to create a seemingly impossible situation. The individual parts are usually not that memorable, and even taken everything together, every aspect of the impossible crime feels a bit too seperate from the rest with little synergy, so it's hard to really think of this as a great locked room mystery simply based on its mechanical features. The story is made more interesting with the underlying storyline, which is having Camel run into Wakita, who was revealed in previous volumes to be a disguised Rum, second-in-command of the Black Organization.  The reason why Camel has to hide his true identity is because he and Rum recognize each other, but now the two men happen to gather in the same flat, and they both immediately sense danger. So while Conan, the police and Camel are trying to solve the murder, Rum/Wakita is also trying to determine what the connection is between Camel and Conan, making it more difficult for Conan to solve the case the way he always does.

This story connects directly to Where The Chaos Ends: the police investigation ends and all the witnesses are free to go their own way. Wakita/Rum commands his underlings to kidnap Camel, but just before that happens, Camel is stopped by another resident of the apartment building. Camel is mistaken to be a friend of one of the residents there, who is playing very loud music. The neighbors on both sides happen to be game streamers and the loud music is interrupting their livestreams, so they want Camel to tell the man to stop. It happens Camel and the man in question just quarreled once in front of the building, but they go up to the flat, but there's no answer despite their knocking. The landlord opens the door again, but finds it locked with the door chain. Camel and Conan spot the man hanging in the back of the room, so Camel breaks the chain and rushes to the man, but it's too late: the man apparently hung himself from a pull-up bar. Hints scattered around the flat however make Conan and Camel suspect the man was murdered inside a locked room, and by one of his two neighbors nonetheless, but both claim to have an alibi as they were live-streaming games and interacting with their viewers.

This is just hilarious. So there's a locked room-murder in a flat, Conan solves it, the police is just ready to leave and then ANOTHER locked-room murder happens in another flat in the same building, with the landlord being asked to unlock the door both times? This is insane!

It's a murder in the same building... and mystery-wise, it's also very similar to the first story, with the murderer stringing variations of a few relatively simple, often-seen tricks to accomplish the locked room. While the idea of live-streams acting as an alibi is interesting, I feel too little is done with it, with little of the potential offered by this concept explored in depth. Had this story been written ten years ago, I am sure Aoyama would have managed to explore the game-live-stream-as-part-of-a-mystery concept in more depth, but with health and scheduling issues, it seems Aoyama for the last few years have relied on much simpler mystery plots, instead focusing more on the character relationship developments needed to advance the overall storyline. Here we have the same deal, as it turns out the assistant-teacher of the class of Conan and the Detective Boys, Wakasa has also arrived at the scene, bringing her in close contact with sushi chef Wakita/Rum. As revealed in earlier volumes, Wakasa too is actually Asaka, a former bodyguard in disguise, and she has a beef with Rum: her run-in with Wakita immediately confirms her suspicions about his true identity, while he too finally manages to confirm for himself who Wakasa truly is. Thus the reader is treated to a battle being played beneath the water surface, as Rum has identified both Asaka and Camel, and they have identified him: how are they going to get out of this situation? The story ends with a somewhat odd solution chapter, where Conan confirms for himself that Wakita is Rum in disguise: while this was already explicitly revealed to the reader, we now learn how Conan managed to figure that out based on the hints that have been laid throughout the series every since the character of Wakita was introduced in the series. It feels a but superfluous, because the reader already knew this fact, but I do like some of the hints.

The Secret Hidden in the Photograph at first seems disconnected from the previous storyline and starts with Ran, Sonoko, Conan and Sera Masumi visiting a hotel for high tea. Just as Sera parks her motorcycle at the hotel, a sleazy man praises her motorcycle and asks if they ever met. Ran and Sonoko immediately suspect the man's hitting on Sera, but both Sera and the man truly seem to have some recollection of each other, but they are not sure from what. At the hotel, Sonoko and Ran notices a famous actor and an influential politician are also present, though "incognito". Conan deduces that the man who spoke to Sera is in fact a journalist. Sera realizes she saw him at the hotel bombing case she was involved in: the journalist had taken a picture of the crowd, including Sera and her "little sister" Mary. Sera needs "convince" the journalist to delete the picture so she rushes to his hotel room, just as he returns with his girlfriend following him. He says he forgot his phone so he pops in the room, with all the others waiting outside, but when he doesn't reappear even after ten minutes, they peek inside, only to find the journalist with his head bashed in, with no other person in the hotel room! The actor and politician also appear at the door because of the ruckus, and it is soon revealed both men were being blackmailed by the journalist with compromising pictures, giving both men a motive for the murder, but if either of them did it, how did they escape the room while Sera and the others were waiting outside the door?

Again a story where the underlying plot, the threat of having the crowd picture that also includes Mary and Sera being published, is more interesting than the actual mystery: the solution to the locked-room mystery includes trite elements that we haven't seen used with such little originality in this series since the very first volumes. Meanwhile, the "first half" of what the culprit did to pull off this crime hinges on him counting on something the victim would do that seems very unreliable. Explaining what the culprit did in the most simple terms also results in a very silly sentence that you wouldn't expect to be used as in a mystery story: not that it is a very sure way to actually achieve what the murderer wanted though... 

The volume ends with the first chapter of Memories of a Ring, in which Ran, her father and Conan are relaxing at a hotel with hot springs which by sheer coincidence is also visited by Kanagawa Prefectural Police Mobile Unit squad leader Hagiwara Chihaya and her friend, and also by Inspector Yokomizo (Chihaya and Yokomizo being the focal characters of the film Fallen Angel of the Highway). There's also a group of women there, who used to be in the same school club. When one of them looses her ring, the others help looking for it, but then one of the friends is found murdered. Unfortunately, fans who read the collected volumes will have to wait until autumn, as that's when volume 109 is scheduled. Oh well, at least it's not 2027...

Detective Conan volume 108 sadly enough doesn't manage to break the mold of the stories of the last few years: with Aoyama not being able to publish weekly chapters consistently anymore, most of the stories end up being forced to include some element that is connected to the greater storyline just to keep things going, and evident from the quality of the more recent years, Aoyama has trouble juggling that with cool short mystery stories with original or memorable tricks. While I am interested in seeing how the greater mystery unfolds with all these cool characters, I can't deny I really miss having stories I vividly remember because of what cool tricks they used, or because it had a great whodunnit plot. I'll always be reading this series and be there when it ends, but I can't deny I really miss the better mystery stories of yore.

Original Japanese title(s):  青山剛昌『名探偵コナン』第108巻

The Borrowed Shield

"Do you understand, Seiya? To defeat this dragon, you must destroy my shield. And that is impossible. Your hardest punch or kick won't scratch this shield!"

"Saint Seiya" 

I suppose many people who read this blog, will have first heard about the spear and shield story from Ace Attorney. I first heard it from Saint Seiya of all places...

After moving to the Philippines, Kirishima Outarou got duped by a "friend" and was forced into a life of crime. He eventually found a way to escape and return to Japan, but with part of his life wasted, he basically had nothing to live for until an old friend pays him a visit. Kusatsu Masamori and Kirishima were great friends back in high school. Kusatsu had always been a fan of mystery novels, and as the son of a rather wealthy family, he was able to make his dreams come true in recent years, opening his own detective agency. However, Kusatsu was also infamous for his bad luck that usually manifested in streaks of unbelievable incidents happening to and around him. Indeed, a few months ago, he got into a horrible accident and he has lost the use of his legs. Kusatsu now wants to partner up with his old friend Kirishima. Kusatsu will handle the thinking, representing the "brains" of the partnership, while Kirishima, as his assistant, would represent the "brawn" of the agency, acting as Kirishima's man in the field and capable of doing the "dirty" things Kusatsu never could. Kirishima is reluctant to accept the offer at first, until he learns Kusatsu has been after a certain criminal for several years: "Himiko" is a consulting criminal, who aids criminals in fabrication and falsification. Her expertise lies in planting false clues that lead to false solutions, pointing away from the real culprit, putting the police on the wrong track and allowing murderers to get away scot-free. It turns out that this "Himiko" is in fact the third childhood friend: Himi Asuka, the girl who would always outsmart Kusatsu, and who would always outfight Kirishima. She has now turned to a life of crime, and Kusatsu is determined to stop her. In Houjou Kie's 2026 novel Tate to Hoko, which also has the English title When the Shield Meets the Spear, the reader is shown what happens when the impregnable shield for criminals meets with the unstoppable spear that penetrates through all the deceit in order to unveil all crimes?  

A new Houjou Kie book, and that of course means I'm there in the front row on the release day. This novel is not related to any of her previous books by the way, and if I remember correctly, it's her first novel via publisher Kadokawa too. I've of course been a fan of the former member of the Kyoto University Mystery Club since her debut novel Jikuu Ryokousha no Sunadokei ("The Hourglass of the Time-Space Traveller. Especially these last two, three years, her release schedule has become quite busy with a lot of regular short stories being serialized in all kinds of magazines, but to be honest, it's still her long novels that manage to impress me the most each time due to the insanely dense clewing and plotting going on in her books. So when it was announced her newest book would be released in March 2026 (in fact, it was released a week before this review goes up), I knew I'd be getting the book immediately. Especially as the title really interested: In Japanese (and Chinese), the characters for "shield" and "spear" form a compound word meaning "contradiction", originating from the tale of an invincible spear and impregnable shield (which of course, contradict each other's existence). 

It's not surprising that Houjou came up with a detective (duo) that represents the "unstoppable spear" and a criminal that creates an "impregnable shield": in most of Houjou's works, she plays with the idea that detectives and criminals are in fact two sides of the same coin, and most of the detective characters in her books have some shady background to them, from Ryuuzen Yuuki in Kotou no Raihousha ("Visitors on the Remote Island") being forced into a detective role despite him actually planning a crime, Kiryuu being the hotel detective and enforcer for the Amulet Hotel, which caters to criminals exclusively and Kuroba being the ghost of the "Perfect Crime Contractor" finding himself becoming a mentor in detection in Shoujo ni wa Mukanai Kanzen Hanzai ("An Unsuitable Perfect Crime for a Girl"). In When the Shield Meets the Spear, we see similar dynamics. Himi "Himiko" Asuka is a specialist who can be reached via certain social media apps and she helps people, most often people who end up murdering someone, with the cover-up. She instructs her clients how to plant specific false pieces of evidence and clues, that will lead the police to a false solution, for example making it appear it was an accident. Himiko is a master at reading situations and adapting to them, which is also reflected in her thinking: she can instantly see how the police, or even Kusatsu and Kirishima will seize up a situation, and advise the criminal as to what clues to plant in order to point away from the truth. She therefore also has to act in a detective in a way, as she has to deduce how her opponents will react and build her defences around that. Meanwhile, Kusatsu and Kirishima form a formidable duo as the members of the K&K Detective Agency because they handle different parts of the detective work: Kusatsu is without a doubt the brain: with the loss of the use of his legs, he mainly acts as an armchair detective nowadays, building his theories based on the reports made by Kirishima, who investigates the crime scenes/interviews the suspects for him. More often than not though, Kusatsu will manage to solve the crime before Kirishima has completed his report. Meanwhile, Kirishima handles the brawn or "violent force" of the duo. Kirishima had always excelled physically, and his time as a low-time criminal in the Philippines only strengthened that side of him. Kirishima is not afraid to play dirty in order to win, which includes doing things that... aren't really legal, but hey, sometimes it's necessary to break into a house or restrain somebody to find evidence, right? The K&K Detective Agency being detectives who can play dirty, and Himiko being a criminal who thinks like a detective, are the ingredients for a great premise.

When the Shield Meets the Spear is a novel, though you could consider it a short story collection, as we follow the K&K Detective Agency and Himiko as they cross paths across three adventures. In the first story, K&K Detective Agency are asked by the police to investigate a strange death that occured in the home of a former boxer. The boxer had been holding a small party at his house to celebrate the engagement of two childhood friends. While everyone but one friend was out of the house for grocery shopping, this remaining friend died in the large bathroom, which houses its own hot spring bath. The house was completely locked from the inside, with the key being found lying next to the victim in the bathroom. The reader learns immediately it was indeed the boxer who committed the crime and immediately after the deed, he requested the help of Himiko to ensure the crime would appear as a simple "slipped in the bathroom" accident, though his initial attempt at disguising his crime, before he called Himiko, unfortunately led to a contradiction that led to the police asking K&K to look into the case.

What is interesting about this story is that it shows immediately that When the Shield Meets the Spear is very reminiscent of a Columbo-style story in set-up, even if it's not really an inverted detective story. To explain in more detail: in When the Shield Meets the Spear, Kusatsu usually manages to solve the initial murder early on, seeing through the first attempt by the murderer to disguise their crimes. In series like Columbo and Furuhata Ninzaburou, it's often the "Columbo is getting close, let's do something" follow-up attempt at fooling the police that leads to their arrest , but in this book, this is the point where the story really starts. After Kusatsu's first deductions, we'll learn Himiko is already messing with the crime scene, altering or destroying crucial pieces of evidence or planting false clues, that lead to new solutions (that of course point away from the real murderer). These are very entertaining and captivating parts: it shows how you can change chains of deductions and their outcomes completely by altering small points, and often it only takes a small nudge to lead you away from what you know is actually the truth. What is fun here is that Houjou plays the game in a fair manner here: the reader is always made aware of a key term or word in Himiko's instructions to the culprit, which allows the murderer to completely overturn Kusatsu's initial (correct!) deductions, often just by introducing one fake clue. From there, we see Kusatsu and Kirishima react again, having to penetrate through this second layer of defense and it's often here were Kusatsu's brain isn't enough: Kusatsu and Kirishima too have to play a little bit dirty to break through the illusions created by Himiko. 

Because of that, we get a lot of battles that go back and forth in When the Shield Meets the Spear, though moment-to-moment deductions are a bit simpler than we have seen in her other work. For example the initial locked room murder trick in this first story really relies on a very simple trick, but then Himiko changes something about the crime scene, which renders Kusatsu's deductions improvable to the police, so then K&K Detective Agency has to come up with something else again. This constant adapting to a new situation is something we have seen a lot in Houjou's work, but because the three chapters in this book are mostly self-contained, I can't help but feel the scale of the deductions in these stories are a bit shorter/simpler than what we might be used to. This first story does have some great moments as we see both parties going far to reach their respective objectives. Because the criminal only has limited time/means to mess with the crime scene, Houjou manages to present this "what false trail will they create with what false clue" mystery as a fair mystery, as this false solution is properly foreshadowed. Still, because the stories are mostly self-contained, you don't have really moments where an early planted clue is used to shake up things much later in the story, as you'd see in some of Houjou's other books, though she does manage to plant some lore clues throughout the stories. 

The second story starts with great premise: the president of a health product company and two of his managers were on a business trip on Thursday in Osaka, with Friday being a holiday. The president left his employees early in the evening in Osaka and hasn't been heard of since. Which is a bit odd, but still, it was a long weekend, so nobody really worried about him. On Monday morning, just as everyone was wondering why he was absent today, a large package from Osaka was delivered to the company and inside they found... the director's dead body! This second story is a lot trickier than the first story right from the start. While the first story starts with the reader being shown who the murderer is, making the first part of that story (until Kusatsu's initial deductions) a howdunnit, this second story keeps the murderer's identity a secret at first, making the first part (again, until Kusatsu's first deductions) both a howdunnit and whodunnit. From there, Himiko starts messing with the crime scene again, neutralizing Kusatsu's deductions and forcing him to find a new way to capture the culprit despite the changed circumstances of the crime and the initial pieces of evidence proving his theory being rendered useless. The puzzle behind why the murderer sent the victim's body in a package to Tokyo is pretty good even as is, and the added "confusion" created by Himiko only makes it more fun. This second story also builds to a surprisingly dramatic finale, with the second half of the story revealing there were pretty complex things going on behind the scenes, though it can be argued whether the build-up to some of these developments is fair enough. 

The final chapter is the longest and the most ambitious too. K&K Detective Agency is asked to look into the murder of a writer (who also happens to be son of the former head of the Metropolitan Police Department's Criminal Affairs Division). The victim was found dead in his own locked study at home in Kotakara Village, near the mountains of Okutama. Kotakara Village is a very small, isolated community, and the village itself can only be reached via one path. On the night of the murder, the whole village was engaged with their local festival, which celebrates children, giving them the freedom to do whatever they want that night. The few dozen of people in the village were all either in the village hall to attend to the festival or being on guard duty at the village entrance point. There were also two outsiders present, a police officer who was giving a safety presentation for the children and a journalist. Interviewing all the people in the village however lead to the strange conclusion that every single person in the village was accounted for during the time of the murder. So who could've killed the writer?

This is written as the grand finale and it definitely has the huge twists and reveals you'd expect of one... which is why it feels a bit disappointing this is chapter three of the book. In-universe, K&K Detective Agency has been active for about two years, in which Kusatsu and Kirishima crossed Himiko's path more often, but for us readers, these events all start about two-hundred pages/two stories in, which makes some of these events feel far too huge at this point of the book, like a season finale, even though we're just halfway into the series. Of course, it might have been difficult to "extend" this season before we got this finale (the book is fairly long as it is now, while unless you're a light novel series, it's hard to plan a series ahead because nobody is guaranteed a sequel), but I can't deny I really wish there had been more build-up as a series, to gain maximum satisfaction from this finale. 

This story is mystery-wise definitely the trickiest of the whole book: Himiko creates some great misdirection early on in regards to the crime scene, and we have multiple false solutions here (with proper clue trails) that will fool the reader/detectives.  At times, the story will even feel a bit unfair, though surprisingly, Houjou then offers a fair solution to the unfair situation, which basically undoes the initial unfairness. The mystery is thus full of twists and turns, with K&K Detective Agency being forced to alternate rapidly between attack and defense turns, and that results in some suspenseful moments despite a lot of the story just being... people explaining their deductions. The way K&K eventually resolves the situation is clever, and makes great use of the setting and the respective roles of both men, making them equal members in this partnership, even if Kirishima is always addressed as "Kusatsu's assistant." The setting of Kotakara Village is also pretty interesting, with a local festival and rituals that are used well in terms of setting up and supporting the mystery plot, though I do think this setting could've been exploited better with more pages: Kotakara Village is the kind of place you'll see in the Toujou Genya or Kindaichi Kousuke novels and with some more development, could easily have been the setting for a whole novel, but here things feel a bit hasty/underdeveloped, which is a shame. 

I do have to admit that as much as I enjoyed this book (and that's a lot!), the fact Tate to Hoko is basically set-up as an interlinked short story collection rather than a "normal" novel, means we don't really see the insane plotting and clewing going on in Houjou's other novels, and that's a bit disappointing. While most of her novels have her detectives dealing with several problems in sequence, her novels usually have her at her best, with later problems/crime scenes/situations often requiring clues planted much earlier in order to solve them, with some of her best work basically being a web of clues from start to finish. Tate to Hoko is far simpler, with most of the information necessary being contained to each chapter. The concept of the book is nonetheless great though, with the constant transformation of the facts and the crime scene creating a fluid mystery story that allow for fun back and forth deductions. The duo of Kusatsu's brains and Kirishima's brawn is also great, with especially the times when after a series of Kusatsu's "clean" deductions, Kirishima is allowed to play dirty. I do hope this becomes a series, because even though I thought this was a great mystery, I do feel some of the things done here might've worked better if she had more time(pages/books) to develop those ideas. I also wonder whether Houjou could also write one single story/one single case with the same premise of someone constantly tampering with the crime scene/clues to create false solutions.

Original Japanese title(s):  方丈貴恵『盾と矛』

By Dawn's Early Light

"Well, I'll be tougher than the toughies, and sharper than the sharpies -- And I'll make my money square!"

"The Life and Times of Scrooge McDuck" 

Visited Sapporo recently actually. All the dairy products (soft serves!!!) were amazing.

Golden Kamuy is a highly succesful manga series created by Noda Satoru, set in Hokkaido, soon after the 1904-1905 Russo-Japanese War. It follows Sugimoto, a war veteran and the Ainu girl Asirpa on their quest to find a fortune of gold of the Ainu people, with other parties also after the enormous treasure. The manga is well-known for its historical setting, incorporating real historical events into the plot. It also focuses a lot on Hokkaido and the Ainu culture, exploring the Ainu people in that period in time. The manga has been adapted into a succesful anime series, and there's also a live-action film series. 

And of course, there's a mystery spin-off book! Or else I wouldn't be writing about it here.

I have in fact not read the manga nor seen the anime. And I only caught like the only first 15 minutes of the first Golden Kamuy film. So I know next to nothing about the series. But when it was announced last year that not only the very first Golden Kamuy spin-off novel would be a mystery story, but that it was also written by none other than Ibuki Amon, I knew instantly I wanted to read it, even without knowledge of the series. It would not be the first time I have read a mystery book based on a Shonen Jump franchise I'm not super familiar with (which reminds me I also need to read the second Kinnikuman mystery short story collection), and more importantly: Ibuki Amon is basically the person you want to be writing mystery short stories with a historical setting, with plots that utilize the time period to their fullest, ranging from objects and historical events to culture. Golden Kamuy: Tsurumi Tokushirou no Shukugan ("Golden Kamuy: The Aspirations of Tsurumi Tokushirou") is a prequel short story collection set during the Russo-Japanese War and it follows Tsurumi Tokushirou, First Lieutenant of the 7th Division of the Imperial Japanese Army. Tsurumi is in fact the antagonist of the main series, but his popularity have thus earned him the honor of being the protagonist of the book. Tsurumi is a highly strategic, calculating officer who nonetheless cares about the men serving beneath and besides him. The 7th Division is sent deep into Russian grounds as they move from one battlefield to another to support other divisions and Tsurumi, in his position of First Lieutenant, acts as the platoon leader, being the link between command and the men on the ground. In Tsurumi Tokushirou no Shukugan, we see how the 7th Division moves deeper into Russia as the war wages on, but during their deployment, the members of the 7th Division come across several mysterious incidents, including sightings of the ghost of a fallen comrade patrolling at night, the disappearance of a war prisoner from a guarded tent and a series of murders on Japanese soldiers right in the middle of their own camp, without the enemy ever being detected. While these cases baffle his soldiers, it's always Tsurumi who holds the answers to the questions.

I have to admit that while I bought this book without much worries about my non-existing familiarity with the series, I was taken aback by the first few pages of the book, which featured 15(!) named characters of the 7th Division, all with profile pictures and character introduction, and then more pages that explain the military ranks of the people in the 7th Division, and a chart of the battles the 7th Division were involved with during the war. Once you get reading, you'll realize you'll get explained all of this within the stories themselves too, but the front-loaded info-dump pages were a bit intimidating. The book features five stories, which all follow different members of the 7th Division as they encounter weird cases and see how Tsurumi handles all of them. Each of the stories show how these men become devoted followers of Tsurumi, recognizing not only the aspirations of the man, but also the heart he has for the mission and for the men who fight along him, which earns him the respect and loyalty of the men that see his actions in person. While the stories are all completely original creations by Ibuki Amon, the book does feature several original illustrations made for this book by the original series creator Noda Satoru. 

The book opens with Yuurei Hoshou ("The Ghostly Sentry"), which follows Tanigaki Genjirou, Private First Class. The story follows Tanigaki who is put on night guard. He stands on top of a hill, when he hears a bell, and then he briefly spots someone else standing on an opposite hill: for a moment he fears an enemy, but he soon recognizes the face of his fellow soldier Yoshino. He calls out to Yoshino, but the figure disappears, followed by Tsurumi appearing next to Tanigaki. Tanigaki mentions seeing Yoshino suddenly appear, when Tsurumi informs him that Yoshino already died two days ago on the battlefield. So who did Tanigaki see patrolling in the night? This is a story that is less about the how of how the ghost of Yoshino appeared in front of Tanigaki, but more about the why: which is absolutely fantastic. The reason is firmly grounded in the historical and cultural context of the story, being incredibly convincing. It is hard to even hint at the explanation, because I have the feeling a simple nudge in the right direction might give it all away because it's ultimately a surprisingly simple matter, but Ibuki does a great job at not pointing too much at it until the reveal.

Shiroi Nipponhei ("The White Japanese Soldier"), told from the perspective of Warrant Officer Kikuta Mokutarou, starts with Mokutarou on the verge of being shot by a Russian soldier who surprised him, but for some reason the Russian soldier hesitates for a second before he cried out "the White Japanese!" in Russia, giving Mokutarou's comrades the time to save him. Everyone is puzzled by the Russian soldier's cry, because Mokutarou, and all the other Japanese soldiers, were wearing their black uniform. After interrogating the soldier, Mokutarou learns that the soldier had previously had encountered a Japanese soldier in a white uniform, whom he shot at point-blank range, but the soldier was unharmed by his bullet. The Japanese soldiers doubt the accuracy of the story, suggesting the Russian soldier just missed his mark, though they have no idea why the soldier would have mistaken their uniform for black. When later Mokutarou visits a comrade, he's shocked when that comrade asks Mokutarou why he's wearing a white uniform instead of his usual black... This is a mystery story that has a cool idea in regards to the solution, but the way it works as a mystery story is a bit uneven: it's not really structured as a fair clue-to-solution style of story, making the reveal not as satisfying as it could've been. Again, it's less the how that is memorable, but more the why, with this why being a lot more ambitious than the previous one, but at the same time, because of that wider range, a little bit harder to swallow, because it immediately raises questions about the feasibility, something that the first story did much better.

Habutae Tent to Misshitsu ("The Sealed Field Tent") follows Usami Tokishige, Superior Private of the 7th Division. The division has been hastily moving across the battlefield as they are needed to support an important attack. On their way, they manage to capture a group of Russian soldiers and Tsurumi is ordered to interrogate the leading officer, as they need information on the Russian platoons stationed at their destination. While everyone, from Tsurumi's superiors to the men beneath him, suggest beating the information out of the officer, Tsurumi alone suggests treating their prisoner of war with the respect his rank deserves, and the man is kept in a private tent. Usami is one of the two guards placed at the exit of the tent, while Tsurumi goes out for a bit. Tsurumi returns later with some food for the officer, but apparently can't get anything out of the man, so Tsurumi leaves again. Another prisoner however manages to escape and attacks Usami's fellow guard, but eventually Tsurumi and Usami manage to take out the escapee. They suspect the escapee was trying to rescue his commanding officer, but when they look inside the tent, they find the Russian officer is gone! But this is impossible, as there's only one exit out of the tent, and while Usami had been distracted by the attacker for a while, he swears nobody escaped from the tent during his fight in front of the tent. So how did the Russian officer escape? This is the best story of the collection, as it manages to best combine both a good how and why. The way the Russian officer disappeared from the tent is perhaps a bit simple, but it makes great use of the historical/cultural setting and Amon also manages to introduce enough depth to also delve into false solutions a bit. The why is absolutely stunning, and really only works in a war-setting and with certain characters, but it works so insanely well in this story. It is an insane motive and while not as intuitive as what you'd see in the Father Brown stories, there's an essential core to it that does feel like it could've been in a Father Brown story: it hinges on a very instinctivee, emotional concept that doesn't sound logical at all, and yet it is very convincing.

Toki ni wa Yasashiku Minai Furi ("Sometimes Gently Pretending Not to Notice") is told from the perspective of Superior Private Ogata Hyakunosuke. The soldiers in the 7th Division are slowly becoming restless, when they learn there's been a second murder on one of their fellow soldiers. While soldiers dying on the battlefield is not a surprise at all, there's something special about two specific murders: these soldiers were killed in the middle of their own camp. As one would expect, the Japanese camp is set-up far away from the Russian enemy, with night sentries making sure that the camp itself is safe, but twice already an enemy has managed to strike at fellow Japanese soldiers, who assumed they were safe within the confines of their camp. While at first, they assumed some lone Russian soldier might have made his way into their camp and killed one of them before escaping, this theory quickly loses credibility by the second murder, as it's rather unbelievable an enemy could sneak inside the camp twice. Suspicion therefore turns to someone within the camp, so who is this traitor? This story is basicallly all about the why, as the story basically soon points out all the victims were basically just surprised by whom they thought was a comrade. The why is, as is basically the norm for this collection, a memorable matter that only makes any sense in the specific historical/cultural context of the story, being a war-time story of soldiers being gone for months from home, fighting daily deep within enemy grounds. This may even be the shortest story of them all, but the motive definitely ranks among the strongest of the collection in terms of memorability. In practice, you'd think some of the actions of the murderer are a bit contradictionary, but again, this being a story set right in the middle of an on-going war basically makes the motive not only viable, but even believable. 

The final story, Tsurumi Tokushirou wa Madowanai ("Tsurumi Tokushirou Does Not Waver") is about Sergeant Tsukishima Hajime, a very loyal subordinate to Tsurumi, who will follow his orders no matter what. The 7th Division is visited for an inspection by a commander who has been wavering in his leadership of the army as the war continues: while the soldiers fighting the battles on the ground have a feeling they'll get through, the commander is having second thoughts, which might endanger their opportunity at defeating their enemy. Tsukishima is handed a suspicious package by Tsurumi and is ordered to plant alongside the route the commander will be taking during his inspection. The very precise Tsurumi gives about where to place the package make it clear it's not a safe package, and Tsukishima understands Tsurumi is trying to take matters into his own hands to push the Japanese army forward, but Tsukishima apparently mistimed or misplaced the package, as the explosion does result in multiple casualties, but the commander goes unharmed. Will this botched-up attempt at the commander's life mean the end of Tsurumi and his aspirations? Well, now, because otherwise the main series wouldn't have an antagonist.  This one feels more like a thriller than a conventional mystery story, with Tsukishima being ordered to do something that obviously is illegal, and we see him have to deal with the aftermath of his mistakenly planted bomb. Because of this, it's also not a really a well-clewed story, as the emphasis lies more on the emotional turmoil within Tsukishima as he realizes his mistake will have consequences not for him alone, but also for Tsurumi, whom he sees as vital to the division. Of course, as the title says, Tsurumi does not waver and he manages to deal with the matter nonetheless, but the "solution" to what he does is not really set-up with clues or anything. While the solution does recontextualize a few things Tsurumi did or said throughout the story, the twist doesn't feel as strong as some of the surprises we saw in earlier stories in terms of character motivations/actions. It does portray a strong Tsurumi, in a way I suspect that ties deeply to the main series, and in that respect, I can't really fault this story, because I assume most people who read this book are interested in the character of Tsurumi, rather than the mystery set-ups, but I did find it disappointing I found the previous four stories stronger than the finale as mystery stories.

As I haven't read the original series, I can't say whether Golden Kamuy: Tsurumi Tokushirou no Shukugan contains anything that makes this instant recommendation to Golden Kamuy fans: perhaps just knowing it's about Tsurumi's time in the Russo-Japanese War is enough, or knowing which people of the 7th Division are featured in this book. As a fan of mystery fiction however, and as someone who has constantly been admiring Ibuki Amon's historical short story mysteries, I think Golden Kamuy: Tsurumi Tokushirou no Shukugan is overall a very solid book. Ultimately, I don't think my unfamiliarity with the source material really hurt my experience, as Ibuki always manages to write solid mysteries based on well-researched historical and cultural settings and presenting them well to the reader. The stories here are no expection, so it didn't take long for me to be all familiar with the setting, and at the same time, be amazed with the plots Ibuki comes up with based on the setting of the early 1900s setting and the Russo-Japanese War background. So I can safely recommend this book if you're just into cool historical mystery fiction!

Original Japanese title(s): 野田サトル（原作・イラスト）, 伊吹亜門（小説）『ゴールデンカムイ 鶴見篤四郎の宿願』: 「幽霊歩哨 《谷垣源次郎》」/「白い日本兵 《菊田杢太郎》」/「羽二重天幕の密室 《宇佐美時重》」/「時にはやさしく見ないふり 《尾形百之助》」/「鶴見篤四郎は惑わない 《月島 基》」

A Case Of Spirits

"Tell me, Leonard," he said. "Has it ever occurred to you that one day wars will be fought with brains?"

Leonard picked up his coffee cup. "Oh dear. Won’t that be rather messy?" he said.

"The Fifth Elephant" 

It was only after buying today's book I realized I basically own no other books by the same publisher (Gentosha)...

The handsome Hamon Kyousuke is a medium who's been attracting a lot of attention lately and the television screenwriter Kagitani Takashi has organized a small seance at the house of an art collector with Hamon. Other guests include art-related people as well as three editors working for a magazine, including Tomoe and Makabe, the latter having a crush on Tomoe, but unable to propose due to an inherited debt. During the seance, Hamon is challenged on his psychic powers, and he defiantly announces he can use his powers to remotely kill someone. He asks for anyone to name someone they want to have killed, and while initially nobody dares to utter a name, Tomoe and Makabe's superior eventually names an artist, because he stood him and Makabe up earlier this day despite having an appointment. Hamon then says he will take control of the artist's body, forcing himself to commit suicide. While they initially don't believe Hamon, doubt starts to creep in so they drive by the artist's house to check up on him, only to find all the furniture being placed outside the house. They have to move stuff around, only to find the door locked from the inside. And inside the locked house, they find the artist dead, hanging from the ceiling as announced by Hamon! Unable to believe Hamon truly has powers, murder is suspected by those involved in the seance, including the detective Senoo Yuuji, but how did Hamon commit this locked room murder, and why was everything placed outside? When later Hamon once again announces a remote murder and another body is found, people start to think Hamon really has the power to control people and make them commit suicide, but Senoo is not convinced and assisted by Makabe, he uncovers the truth in Asukabe Katsunori's Leonardo no Chinmoku ("The Silence of Leonardo", 2004).

Leonardo no Chinmoku was originally released in 2004, but only got its pocket re-release in 2025, after the amazing revival of interest in Asukabe's work, that was set in motion after the bookshops Shosen and Horindo put out limited facsimile releases of his out-of-print works: the facsimile release Datenshi Goumonkei ("Torture of the Fallen Angels" 2008) in particular was a notable event, gathering a lot of attention. Since then, publishers have been re-releasing a lot of Asukabe's books from their catalogues that had previously been out-of-print for over a decade, like Lamia Gyakusatsu ("Lamia Massacre"). Leonardo no Chinmoku is another of these "hey, it's a bit late but perhaps we should put out a pocket" release.

The story revolves around a problem often see in other psychic/seance-themed mysteries: a psychic correctly announcing something will happen, with the mystery focusing on how they could've known that: of course the psychic in question in this case has an alibi for the death, meaning they themselves couldn't have known about the murder because they committed the murder (or did they, and did they fake their alibis in some way?) In this case, we also have the added mystery of the locked room, and the question of why all the furniture was placed outside. I have to admit I wasn't completely convinced by this murder. A lot of the mechanics surrounding the solution of this mystery revolve around coincidence, with certain events and people just happen to be timing up perfectly by sheer luck. The solution behind how the locked room situation was created too was simple, while the answer to why all the furniture was outside feels underdeveloped: while it touches upon a greater theme and the book does try to present as something big, I don't feel this whydunnit was developed properly as of now: it needed more set-up to give you that "Aha!" feeling, because as it is now, you kinda get what they were going for, but it's not completely convincing and even worse, it's basically unguessable from a fair-play mystery point of view. It'a s shame, because this is when the book is supposed to be most strongly connected to the Leonardo from the title Leonardo no Chinmoku, who is of course Leonardo da Vinci. Art is an important motif throughout most, if not all of Asukabe's books (he even made original paintings for his debut novel!), but I'd say that in this book, art might be of the least importance of all the Asukabe's books I have read until now. 

Whereas the first death predicted by Hamon was found in an 'inside-out' house (furniture found outside), the second victim 'killed remotely' by Hamon is lying found 'upside-down' next to a road, continuing the topsy-turvy theme. While this murder also depends on coincidence up to some degree, I like the build-up of this murder a lot more: the clewing is better, being more connected to other plotlines of the book and with a more even distribution of the clues across the whole book, and I think the way it's connected to the first murder works well too. In hindsight, it's actually funny how much more integrated this murder is to the rest of the book compared to the first locked room murder. I think basically all of the most interesting elements of Leonardo no Chinmoku's narrative revolve around this second death, rather than the first death, even if the actual scene of the first seance is better.

Leonardo no Chinmoku is the most straightforward mystery novel I have read by Asukabe until now, and it's also perhaps my least favorite. While the plot depends a bit too much on coincidence and I don't really think the whydunnit behind the first murder works well, the overall plot is an adequately constructed mystery, with especially the plotlines pertaining to the second half being well-planned. But on the other hand, I can't deny missing some of the insaneness I have seen in other works by Asukabe and while I am not very versed, nor interested in art in general, I do feel the general lack in discussion on art here hurts the book a bit. It's great the book's easily available again now and mind you, this is not a bad mystery novel by any means, but I wouldn't pick this as my first Asukabe to read.

Original Japanese title(s):  飛鳥部勝則『レオナルドの沈黙』

The Mystery of the Pyramid

Mon ami, Bouc! Why would you fly a kite on the pyramids?"

"Death on the Nile" (2022 film adaptation) 

We should have more murder mysteries set in pyramids... 

Kyuujou City is a small rural town, which is effectively run by the Ooki family. The wealthy family owns several enterprises located in the city, thus providing work for a large share of the population, but they are best known for the Ooki General Hospital, a large medical complex specializing in psychiatry. Its symbol is the Pyramid, a eight-storey high building that functions as the main hospital building, housing the psychiatric ward. The building consists of seven floors that form a stepped pyramid, with an open ceiling section at the center of the building. On top of the seventh floor stands a steel pyramid construction, from a smaller pyramid is suspended above the open ceiling of the floors below: this "eighth" floor is the private residence of Ooki Kimihiro, doctor at the hospital and the only son of Ooki Youta, the current director of the hospital, and his wife Ooki Nagi, who researches anti-aging technology at the hospital. This eighth floor is not built directly on top of the floor below, but being suspended as an anti-earthquake measure and was designed by Kimihiro's mother Nagi, who also has a degree in architecture and it was she who created the base design of the pyramid. The ground floor of the Pyramid has a two-meter high Pyramid model in a glass case, right at the center of the Pyramid: Ooki Youta believes in so-called Pyramid Power and once in a while, he prays to the model to enhance himself with Pyramid Power. Regardless of whether the pyramid truly provides him with power or not,  the pyramid has managed to stand in Kyuujou City for nearly four decades, a sign of the Ooki's hold on the city.

While the Pyramid still stands strong, some of the other buildings on the complex are growing too old, so they will be demolished and replaced. Ooki Nagi has made designs for the new building, but she needs more dedicated architects to fill in the details and overlook the construction, and through a mutual acquaintance, Kumode and Miyamura of the Kumode & Miyamura Architecture and Detective Bureau end up with this assignment. They work together with Tobuta Constructions, the construction company that has built all of the Ooki-related buildings. There is a joint meeting between the hospital people, the foreman of Tobuta Constructions and Kumoda and Miyamura at the Pyramid to discuss the upcoming plans. Kumoda sends a drone out to scope the land, and can't help but take a look at the top-floor of the Pyramid, where he sees Ooki Kimihiro having a row with his mother Nagi, after which he retreats to his private quarters (the suspended pyramid above the main pyramid), locking the door behind him. Some time later, Kumode and Miyamura are ready to get started on their work while the others too prepare to leave the pyramid, when suddenly... the suspended pyramid comes falling down the open ceiling, landing with a crash on the pyramid model on the ground floor. The private quarters of Kimihiro are completely destroyed and among the rubble, Kumode discovers Kimihiro, who is not only heavily injured from the fall down and being crushed by the building... he's also been stabbed with a knife! A sickly slender elderly man is also found among the rubble, who appears to be the man who stabbed Kimihiro, but how did he get in Kimihiro's (locked) room to stab him, and why did the pyramid room come falling down? That is only one of the many riddles Kumode faces in Monzen Noriyuki's latest novel Nezumi to Kirin no Pyramid ("The Pyramid of the Mouse and the Giraffe", 2025).

Monzen's latest book opens with crazy diagrams for the Pyramid, a building which in a way symbolizes this story perfectly. On one hand, in real-life, nobody is going to build a gigantic stepped pyramid as the main building of a hospital, nor is anyone going to design that building so the top floor/pyramid is suspended from a metal construction above the rest of the pyramid. It's fantastical and only created like that to act as the setting for a mystery story, and that's great! But not realistic at all of course. But Monzen studied architecture, and realism in that regards is an important aspect of this books, so we have this unrealistic, fanciful, over-the-top building, which at the same time is designed realistically, with Monzen giving exact dimensions and the reader being given explanations of how the weight-baring is done and other things that need to be considered like patient safety, window regulations and how for example what the measures are to prevent rain/other downfall from entering the hospital via the open ceiling. The Pyramid of the Mouse and the Giraffe is honkaku mystery featuring a strange building at its most bizarre, but also its most realistic.

The book opens with the top pyramid come crashing down and the discovery of the stabbed Kimihiro and the unknown elderly man among the rubble, which Kumode soon declares a locked room mystery, because he saw Kimihiro enter and lock his private quarters via his drone, and the elderly man was definitely not inside those quarters at that moment. The book then jumps a few days back in time, where we follow Hotta, the foreman of Tobuta Constructions, as he meets a homeless elderly man living on grounds owned by the hospital. Hotta needs the man to move as they will be using this part as a supply road, but as the two men talk, Hotta becomes interested in this man he calls Mori. Mori turns out to have lived for thirty years at the Ooki General Hospital. He had been held as a mental patient, but Mori swears there was nothing wrong with him: he was just kept captured in the hospital, with his brother (who needed him out of the way) only paying the hospital to keep him there. After twenty years, Mori was 'basically' released, but as he had no money, skills or connections, all he could do was remain at the hospital doing odd jobs. Eventually though, he was completely released, leaving him no choice but to live as a homeless near the hospital. Mori reveals more of the dark history of the Ooki General Hospital to Hotta, how they often put patients in "isolation chambers" in one of the old buildings that is slated to be demolished now. Patients were tied down to concrete slabs and had to go without food for a whole day to "calm them strangle yourself/hang yourself, but the room itself was of course also locked from the outside. Hotta himself also knows of another incident that occured at the hospital that happened prior to this locked room mystery, when someone broke the glass case of the pyramid model: nurses came checking out what had happened as soon as they heard the glass break, but they found the pyramid model gone. But how could someone steal a two-meter high pyramid in mere seconds and leave without leaving a trace? The front door was found open, but the only footprints found outside in the snow belonged to a cat, and it surely wasn't a cat who did it, right?

While Nezumi to Kirin no Pyramid thus starts right off with presenting the main mystery, the flashback to the days before the crash introduce more mysteries that occured several decades ago at the hospital: a locked room murder of a patient in an isolation chamber, and the incredible theft of the pyramid model. There are more mysteries beyond these, like Kumode being intrigued by the strange family sigils found on Nagi's clothes, the mystery of Mori's true identity and whether he's telling Hotta the truth or not, letters supposedly from patients who are being kept in the hospital against their will and more of that. Again, we have here parts that feel part fantasy, and part very realistic. The parts about people being held in the psychiatric ward for decades and eventually losing any reason for wanting to leave (because there's no way to survive on their own after being isolated from the outside world for so long) are creepily realistic, while at the same time, we get an ending where Kumode suggests some of the stories we were told might have been fictional creations by people who are indeed suffering from a mental disease. Because a lot of the mysteries in this story took place several decades ago, Kumode admits it's impossible to find evidence for some of the theories he proposes, but those theories are incredibly weird at times and in a way, honkaku mystery at their best and worst (fantastical solution that is in no way feasible or remotely realistic), so there's always this clash between the fantastical and the realistic throughout the book. This is the most apparent in the mystery of the locked room murder in the isolation chamber about three decades ago: the description of the isolation chamber is horrific and also eerily real, with people being basically tortured there to lose all hope and to basically force them into becoming mentally unstable, while the solution suggested by Kumode is just crazy in terms of how unrealistic it would be. And at the same time, it has some brilliant moments, for example as to how the murder weapon would be disposed of. Kumode later on suggests a different solution that might be as viable as his 'main' one, which is more realistic perhaps, but also just less fun. 

 

The mystery of the stolen model of the pyramid is also a good example of the realism clashing with the fanciful: the idea of how and why the model was stolen is good and just what you want to see in a mystery novel, but Monzen presents its very realistically, showing calculation of certain objects to show how it could actually work, when in most mystery novels you'd just get an explanation and you'd nod, instead of going through all the numbers to make sure it actually works. The way how one hint connects to the isolation chamber murder later on is great though.

And then we come to the main mystery, of Kimihiro being found dead and stabbed in the remnants of the suspended pyramid after it came crashing down seven floors. The locked room aspect of this mystery is surprisingly simple and to be honest, not very impressive: it's basically a variant on one of the oldest tricks, only with a 'grand' presentation due to the pyramid setting. The how behind the crashing pyramid and especially the why though, are fantastic. The whole motive behind the murder is absolutely stunning and genuinely insane. I think the motive could've been worked out better by doing a more robust set-up for the reveal, but the idea itself is one of those motives you'll keep in mind for a loooong time after reading the book. The way it ties back to the fantastical setting of the Pyramid hospital building is impressive too, and on the whole, you do feel this is something perhaps only Monzen could pull off due to his focus on actual buildings. This is definitely the part that makes the book worth reading.

I do think the book could've been longer to flesh out some of the better aspects of the book.As it is now, I feel some important moments just lack the proper build-up and at times, the book borders on the unfair when it comes to it being a mystery novel: more pages would have definitely helped making feel the overall picture more consistent and connected. As it is now, some of the important elements feel like they just suddenly appear to take the main spotlight and it makes the book feel uneven. The book features a recommendation by Nikaidou Reito, and it almost makes me wonder how this story would've been if the two authors had worked together, as a lot of elements in Nezumi to Kirin no Pyramid I can also see working in Nikaidou's style for the earlier Ranko novels. The story is wrapped in a way I have also seen in Nikaidou novels, with a hint of fantasy, which at one hand feels like it should clash with Monzen's style, but I guess having a setting like a mental hospital helps out a bit. 

 Overall though, I think Nezumi to Kirin no Pyramid was a worthwile read, even if there are definitely elements I feel are underdeveloped or not connected well enough to the main narrative yet. At the same time, I enjoy the core mystery plot and the ideas shown there, and the main motive that drives this mystery is just amazing and probably one that I will remember for a long time.

Original Japanese title(s): 門前典之『ネズミとキリンの金字塔（ピラミッド）』