Trouble Island

Tell me, princess 

Now, when did you last let your heart decide? 

I can open your eyes 

Take you wonder by wonder

"A Whole New World"

I do like this cover art a lot...

The members of the art university club Muse travel to the private island of Kiseki Island for a job arranged for them via a former member of the club, who currently works at a museum. Kiseki Island is owned by the Ryuumon Clan, but the island has been sealed off for three decades now. At the time, before World War II, it was the home of "princess" Ryuumon Yukako, the granddaughter of the patriarch of the clan at the time. She had a gigantic manor built on the island called the Chalk Manor, a smaller version of Gaudi's Sagrada Familia and collected all kinds of art. She entertained a lot of men at her home, who all fell for her beauty and all hoped to take her for themselves. However, one night tragedy struck: the princess was found decapitated in the top room of an adjoining outlook tower, where she had gone alone the previous night. However, the only footsteps left in the muddy ground around the tower, were those of her, and the man who discovered her body the following morning (but who has an alibi for the time of death the previous night). A wax doll of Yukako was also found decapitated in the manor. The house and island had been left sealed since, but now the current patriarch of the clan (Yukako's uncle) thinks it's time to open the island again, perhaps turning the manor into a museum. The members of Muse are to stay for a week in the Chalk Manor to try and create a tentative catalogue of the art treasures inside the manor, with proper museum experts coming later based on their findings. They are brought to Kiseki Island on a boat, which will return in a week for the group of 8 students, plus their supervisor, as well as an elderly couple who worked for the Ryuumons and will now take care of food and washing for them during their stay. During their stay, they are shocked to learn that the Ryuumons are actually related to a woman who had been a member of Muse last year, and who was at the center of a shared traumatic experience to all who had been a member at the time. She has passed away now, but left a will addressed to the members of Muse, telling them that the person who will create the best work of art during their stay here on the island, will inherit the island, Chalk Manor and all the art inside! The members are however very reluctant to follow this will, as their memories with the deceased are very dark, so for the time being, they decide to just focus on their work. But then one of the students dies in a freak accident by falling over a balustrade and being crushed by a lamp.Or was it an accident? For the following morning, the decapitated head of the dead student is found in the dining room, having been placed on a plate. Is there a murderer on the island, or is it one of them? And who can solve this mystery in Nikaidou Reito's Kisekjima no Fushigi ("The Wonders of Miracle Island", 1996)?

While the book seems to make it a mystery who the detective will be, I don't think it really works, especially not now in 2024, as almost every write-up on the book will mention it: yes, this is a book in Nikaidou's Mizuno Satoru series, which is immediately obvious because of the title convention. So yeah, we'll see the handsome, but somewhat geeky detective appear here. The Mizuno Satoru series is divided in two eras, with books set in his student days (with books titled [Something] no Fushigi), and books set after he's become a working member of society (with books titled [Location] Magic). In the first book, Karuizawa Magic, we saw Mizuno working as a travel agent, and Kisekjima no Fushigi was released a year later, as the second book in the series, and it seems Nikaidou basically goes back and forth each time between the two eras when publishing the Mizuno books. This is only the second time I read a book about the student Mizuno by the way: Kikounin (Collector) no Fushigi ("The Wonders of Collectors") is one of the very first Nikaidou's I ever read (I mostly remember it from the in-depth Tezuka Osamu discussions), so it's been basically fourteen years since I last read a book about Mizuno set in this era.

I have read a lot of Nikaidou's work, like all of his main Ranko series, and once you start reading his work, you'll quickly notice he's mainly a howdunnit person. He's great influenced by John Dickson Carr, and most of his works feature locked room murders and other impossible crimes. And that's the reason why I got interested in Kisekjima no Fushigi, because it was touted as the work where Nikaidou focuses solely on the whodunnit for a change! The whodunnit form has never been something I associated with him at all, so this surprising twist really made me curious. How would someone best known for creating impossible crimes, tackle a very different kind of mystery writing, with clues pointing to who the culprit is and the logic leading up to that revelation?

In terms of form, Kisekjima no Fushigi follows a very familiar format, being the closed circle situation on an isolated island, and comparisons with And Then There Were None are of course quickly made, and the closed circle with art students and the surprisingly many discussions on various forms of art remind of Ayukawa Tetsuya's Lila-sou Jiken and Maya Yutaka's Natsu to Fuyu no Sonata. As you can guess, the students are getting killed off one by one, and of course, they suspect the killer is one of them, and they start getting more suspicious of each other as the story develops. As a book focusing mostly on the whodunnit, Nikaidou really doesn't do very much with his trademark impossibilities: there's the decapitation on Yukako in the past, but there's not much beyond that, with most murders being possible to most characters (very seldom people have alibis), so you'll have to look out for very different kind of clues if you want to figure out who did it.

But... there's a reason why we associate Nikaidou with the howdunnit and not the whodunnit, and sadly enough, this book tells us enough. As a whodunnit, Kisekjima no Fushigi really isn't remarkable in any way, and seen purely as a whodunnit, there are quite some spots where the logic leading up to the identification of the culprit is playing very lightly with the definition of the term "logical". The book tries to do an Ellery Queen-style "identification of the culprit" segment, but it seldom really works. The logic behind who could've decapitated the first student, whose body had been laid to rest in the cellar after he had been crushed by the lamp, is a prime example of the weird logic: there's one step eliminating two people from the suspect list that make absolutely perfect sense, but then the other characters on the list are eliminated based on just psychological impressions ("they wouldn't do that because they wouldn't"), in order to arrive at the culprit. Other murders often have this too, where there's a moment of a good idea to show someone couldn't have been the murderer, or that something might not have been the way we assumed, but then other moments in the same process are very sloppy, which makes the whole process of elimination feel not convincing, and by the time we arrive at the identity of the culprit, the moment just doesn't feel triumphant at all as you still have all those questions in your mind telling you "Hey, the way that suspect was eliminated... did that actually make any sense?" The result is a whodunnit that... simply has trouble feeling fair to the reader. You can see Nikaidou tried to play with few familiar tropes in classical 'process of elimination'-style deductions, trying to subvert the tropes, but it just falls flat here.

Art plays a surprisingly big role in this story, with the characters name-dropping a lot of art styles and famous artists in various fields as they explore the mansion and discover all kinds of interesting pieces of art, from stained glass windows to wax dolls (9 wax dolls...) to paintings and vases and more. Knowledge of art is also handy for certain parts of the final deduction, though again, you can see Nikaidou isn't really used to doing fair-play whodunnits, as the knowledge necessary to pick up on the clues as Nikaidou intended, isn't provided to the reader before he points it out. While he talks a lot about art throughout the book, the necessary art-related clues are not discussed in detail, making it impossible to guess his intentions until he does his "Tadah!" trick, pretending like you should've caught that before.

It's funny, because there's the impossible crime set three decades ago, about how Yukako got killed and decapitated even though there were no footsteps of the culprit going to/from the tower, and that part alone has at least a more original take than the rest of the whodunnit plot. Apparently, this part alone was originally a short story on its own, starring Ranko, but Nikaidou wasn't content with it, and eventually incorporated it into the backstory for this book. While it's true that on the whole, it's not really that memorable a locked room mystery, and some might even find it utterly insulting, I did kinda like the explanation to how Yukako ended up decapitated, especially the motive behind the actual decapitation. 

As I was reading the book, I did find it odd a lot of the book's setting didn't seem to correspond to the actual story. Like, there's a whole backstory to Kiseki Island, how people used to believe there were Oni living there throwing rocks at people (Kiseki) and how it got renamed to Miracle (Kiseki) later on, and there are still locations on the island named after Oni... but we never visit those places. And then there's the Chalk Manor,  a smaller version of the Sagrada Familia and the book even opens with a super detailed floorplan of the manor... but it's not actually directly relevant to solving the mystery. It makes no difference whether there's a floorplan or not, it at best just makes it slightly easier to visualize the place. It's almost like the setting was originally created for something else, and Nikaidou just ended up using the place for this story. It's a shame because the Chalk Manor is really designed in surprising detail, with all of the rooms accounted for (even though you barely go there in the book, or they are only mentioned in passing), and I was expecting something much more bigger hiding behind it considering how overwhelming the floorplan looks at first.

So I decided to google to see whether anything had been written about my suspicions, and I ended up on on Nikaidou's own website, and it turns out... well, he didn't write about my suspicions, but he did write something else very surprising. Apparently, the version of Kisekijima no Fushigi that got published, is actually the "B version" of the story. The original "A version" featured a different prologue and epilogue, and these framing devices actually led to a very different type of mystery added on top of the whodunnit plot. Nikaidou and the editor apparently couldn't quite make up their mind which version to publish until the very end, and Nikaidou has posted the alternate prologue/epilogue on his site. While the core whodunnit plot doesn't change, I think the added dimension does at least make the book feel a bit more special than it is now, though I can also understand why they went with the simpler B version, as the tone of the book is very different in the A version, which would have worked better as a completely standalone novel. The A version wears some of its inspiration far more prominently on its sleeve, and I do like it for that, so if you have read this book, I do think it's worth to read the A version too if you have the time, just to see how the book was originally conceived.

But while Kisekjima no Fushigi is certainly a very readable book despite its rather lengthy page count, I wouldn't say this is a must-read by any means, especially as it's certainly not written to play up to Nikaidou's strenghts as a mystery writer. As a pure whodunnit, it takes on the correct form, but at no point is it really a showcase of wonderful logic, nor does it manage to really surprise you with the "shocking" revelation of the culprit. 

Original Japanese title(s): 二階堂黎人『奇跡島の不思議』

「人の考えだすことは、所詮、人によって解かれてしまう運命にあるんですよ」

「アリバイを持っていない人間は犯人ではない。これは、推理におけるマーフィーの法則さ」

『軽井沢マジック』

"A person without an alibi can't be the murderer. That's Murphy's Law in mystery"

"Karuizawa Magic"

The start of the academic year is never easy, but I guess the fact that I only had two classes a week last semester did make me kinda... lazy. And with these changes in my spare time, I actually have to find out when to read books between studying (instead of figuring out when to study between reading books). A paradigm shift.

Anyway, today's victim is Nikaidou Reito's Karuizawa Magic. This novel is the first in the Mizuno Satoru series, but like always, I never read things in order, so I've reviewed a couple of the later novels already. But to introduce the series shortly: the Mizuno Satoru series obviously deals with the titular Mizuno Satoru,  a young man who with a shady, yet humorous past, too many friends to count and rather otaku-ish interests. His looks also make him very popular with the opposite gender (until he actually opens his mouth and starts talking, that is). The series is split into two parts, one part dealing with Mizuno's student years, while the second part deals with his years as a working man.

Karuizawa Magic is the first novel in the second part, with Mizuno working at a travel agency. After a business meeting with a hotel for one of their travel packages, Mizuno and his co-worker Yukari (who has a crush on him) end up in Karuizawa. Which might seem nice, but it turns out that a) the deputy-director of the business-partner hotel was killed just as they left the hotel, b) the director himself was killed in the same train Mizuno and Yukari travelled on to Karuizawa and c) they manage to come across a couple of other corpses during their time in Karuizawa. So the police is very, very suspicious of them. And yes, they seem to be justified in that, right? In good old fashioned detective-style, it's up to Mizuno to prove his (and Yukari's) innocence.

I hate to make the awful pun, but Karuizawa Magic is really karui (light). It's clearly a travel mystery like the novels by Nishimura Kyoutarou and Uchida Yasuo. Which can be entertaining themselves, but I was expecting a bit more of Nikaidou Reito. The novel has some neat little premises (a man found dead on top of his cottage's roof, a man whose eyeballs have been scooped out), but the atmosphere surrounding these 'horrible' events is kinda light-hearted, making these incidents seem almost trivial. Had this been a Nikaidou Ranko case, the dark and almost devilish tone of these murders would certainly have been more prominent, I think. Now it's 'oh, we found a man whose eyeballs have been scooped out. Let's have a funny scene with the police and Mizuno arguing').

This overall lightness is made even more apparent because little is done with Mizuno's otaku-tendacies. Some of the later novels do make use of this and they are a lot more entertaining. For example, Collector no Fushigi, as a locked room mystery, was not surprising, but Nikaidou's expert knowledge on Tezuka Osamu and rare book collectors' culture made it a very entertaining novel. The short story collection Mizuno Satoru no Daibouken  also featured some stories that entered into 'otaku' spheres (for example the Yokomizo Seishi fanclub). The character of Mizuno Satoru, who has been all over Asia and with knowledge about all kinds of topics is a great plot-vehicle, allowing the reader to enter the world of 'specialists' on all kinds of fields (from rare collector's figures to stargazing), but sadly enough, none of this is found in Karuizawa Magic.

In fact, I finished the book with a feeling of 'so....this was it?'. I wasn't happy with it, not mad with it, nothing. I just finished it. It's just very.... bland. If I hadn't read other Mizuno Satoru novels before, I think I'd have given up on the series at this point.

Original Japanese title(s): 二階堂黎人　『軽井沢マジック』

The Finishing Stroke

「・・・・昔、この店の店長が言ってました。「人の身体がたんぱく質やビタミンの成分でできているように人の心は時間と思い出の成分でできている。だから自分の昔を思い出すことは現在（いま）の自分の本当を知る事なんだ」って。「自分の心がどんなモノからできあがっているか」。その事を思い出すんだ」
『金魚屋古書店』

"The owner of this shop used to say this. 'Just like how the human body is composed of proteins and vitamins, the human soul is composed of time and memories. That's why looking back at yourself in the past, is to get to know who you really are in the present." You have to remember it. 'What made me what I am?"
 "The Kingyo Old Book Shop"

Bara no Labyrinth ("Labyrinth of Roses"), a short story collection starring his main detective, Nikaidou Ranko. Having read an earlier book starring her, the awesome House of Vampires and some non-Ranko short story collections by Nikaidou, I was expecting much of these stories. Just looking at the titles of the stories made me excited. The Phantom of the Circus? The Face-Eating Monster? The Blazing Devil? How could it not be great, I thought.
Contuining my Nikaidou Reito reading spree, I first took up

Which was a big, big mistake. With only mediocre stories and even a bad story (rabies?!), I was genuinely shocked. I actually had trouble making my way through this book and with every story was hoping it would improve, but it was not to be. Not even once did I get the feeling Nikaidou was really trying with this collection. While nowhere near Murder in Monkeyland-horrible (which would be an accomplisment, I guess...), it was just disappointing how different it was compared to other stuff I read written by him.

Not too fond of the protagonist either. I can't remember how it was handled in House of Vampires, but Ranko is so bland (besides being a super-smart university student), I don't understand why Nikaidou is using her. Heck, if Nikaidou wasn't writing about how beautiful her hair was and how Ranko could've been a model (Every. Single. Story.), you wouldn't even know she was a girl. She might as well be a man. Or a ghost. Or a computer. She is just...there.

Luckily, he made up for it with Kikounin (Collector) no Fushigi ("The Wonders of Collectors"). It was the book I would have written had I been a writer. And had I not been genre savvy enough to see how blatantly self-referencing this book was. Being the story about a) a group of Tezuka Osamu fans who b) also collect rare manga and c) and one of them gets robbed of his rare books and murdered in a locked room, it was like Nikaidou looked straight in my mind when writing this.

And what if the locked room was nothing special? What if the detective was once again Mizuno Satoru, the super Otaku bishounen, who never really gets developed enough. The dialogue, which show how much a Tezuka expert Nikaidou Reito himself is, is full of information on Tezuka, manga releases, the world of rare book collectors and just plain fun to read. For manga/bibliophiles. Visiting bookshops in groups in hopes for that rare find? Done that in real life. Looking for obscure releases? Done that. I have read detectives which touched the subject of bibliophiles, but as this was actually about manga, Collector no Fushigi was even closer to home. Seldom have I read a book which was so recognizable and so much fun. I would have Gary Stue'd myself in this story, had I been the writer. Although I could indeed recognize myself in that victim. Besides the being dead part.　

Original Japanese title(s): 二階堂黎人　『バラ迷宮』/ 「サーカスの怪人」 / 「変装の家」 / 「喰顔鬼」 / 「ある蒐集家の死」 / 「火炎の魔」/ 「薔薇の家の殺人」;　『稀覯人（コレクター）の不思議』

『すべて閣下の仕業』

"Now, in my opinion, Dupin was a very inferior fellow. That trick of his of breaking in on his friends' thoughts with an apropos remark after a quarter of an hour's silence is really very showy and superficial. He had some analytical genius, no doubt; but he was by no means such a phenomenon as Poe appeared to imagine."
"A Study in Scarlet"

When you're reading a detective by a writer called Norizuki Rintarou, who writes about the adventures of a writer called Norizuki Rintarou (who also uses a character called Norizuki Rintarou...), you know this is all one big Ellery Queen tribute. Heck, even the name of the book, Norizuki Rintarou no Bouken ("The Adventures of Norizuki Rintarou") is taken from The Adventures of Ellery Queen (which in turn mirrored The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes...). Luckily, it upholds the tradition of the name, because Norizuki Rintarou no Bouken is just as awesome a short story collection as his famous predecessors.

The stories are very Queen-like, with the first one, Shikeishuu no Puzzle ("Puzzle of the Death Row Inmate"), with its prison setting, being clearly based on The Tragedy of Z and even includes a similar conclusion, where by summing up all the attributes of the killer, the identity of the murderer is deduced. Other stories like Kurogo no Ie ("House of the Black Figure") tend to focus more on motives. And even very grotesque motives in Cannibalism Shouron ("Short Article regarding Cannibalism"). Personal favorite point of the collection and actually very Queen-ish, is the role of books in these stories. Four of the seven stories feature books heavily, like Kirisakima ("The Cutting Monster"), the story of a library, where somebody keeps cutting the title pages of famous detective novels. It's all great stuff (just like its sequel, Norizuki Rintarou no Shinbouken ("The New Adventures of Norizuki Rintarou")). While there is already one story of Norizuki available in English (An Urban Legend Puzzle in: Passport to Crime (editor: Hutchings)), more of this modern Queen should be translated. At once.

The first two stories in Nikaidou Reito's Meitantei Mizuno Satoru no Daibouken ("The Great Adventures of Great Detective Mizuno Satoru") are also kinda Queen-ish in spirit, while the last two stories, with its locked rooms and suggestion of the existence of aliens, remind more of Carr. The protagonist, travel agent Mizuno as a character, isn't very interesting though. Mizuno is somewhat similar to the manga Genshiken's Kousaka, in the sense that while he is handsome, trendy and a great succes with women, he is also actually one of the biggest otaku around, knowing thousands of anime songs, every kaijin in Kamen Rider and just being an enormous mystery buff. The premise could work, but it is handled rather predictable.The stories however are certainly interesting though, and the most interesting story in the collection is The Murder Case of "the Murder Case of the Daimyou's Inn", which offers an alternate solution to Yokomizo Seishi's classic locked room mystery Honjin Satsujin Jiken ("The Murder Case of the Daimyou's Inn"). Although, in retrospect, it does remind me a bit of Queen's A Study in Terror.

Norizuki Rintarou no Bouken also happened to be wrapped in a bookcover bookshops give so people can't see what you're reading, which I normally refuse. But those cassiers are unbelievably quick in doing stuff you don't need ("I don't need a plastic ba... oh..."), so I guess I wasn't quick enough when I bought it. The cover is apparently part of a smoking manners campaign. Inhaled. Burned. Thrown away. If it were anything but a cigarette, it surely would be crying. And a picture of a man making love to a sigaret. Things you can only get in Japan.