Virtual Villainy

"The third one is always the worst."

"X-Men: Apocalypse"

Okay, in reality, of the mystery series I read, it's seldom the third one that's actually the worst. Also: when I ordered this book, I was totally expecting it to end up somewhere on my end-of-year best list due to the previous two volumes... Pretty frustrating when errr, that doesn't happens.

There are a lot of fans of mystery fiction on the internet, but few are as fanatic as "aXe," "Zangya-kun," "The Mad Header,"  "Professor Ban Douzen" and "044APD". These colorful five members of a private video chat group know nothing of each other's private lives, and always use masks and voice-scramblers too hide their faces/voices whenever they appear on the webcam, but they regularly gather in their chat room to play a certain game. A deadly game of intellect. Each time, one of these five acts as the 'quizmaster', providing the others with a locked room murder mystery to solve. The catch? These locked room murders have really been committed by the respective quizmaster! The quizmaster will provide the others with some basic information about the case, and the others are also free to gather information on their own through the news or by investigating the crime scene themselves if possible, but the question will always remain the same: how did the host of the problem actually commit the impossible murder? However, things have also changed since our previous encounters with "aXe," "Zangya-kun," "The Mad Header,"  "Professor Ban Douzen" and "044APD." In Utano Shougo's Misshitsu Satsujin Game - Maniacs (2011), a mysterious figure called "MadHeadaXeDouzen044-kun" has been uploading captured footage of these chat sessions to video streaming sites, making the locked room murder game public to not only the police, but countless of mystery fans who too want to be able to win at this game.

Misshitsu Satsujin Game - Maniacs is the third volume in Utano's Misshitsu Satsujin Game series and you may remember that I've enjoyed the previous two volumes a lot. The various locked room murder mysteries that appeared in the linked short stories were usually very well constructed and a delight to read, but Utano also made brilliant use of the overarching storyline of the chat room. There were all kinds of little surprises that really made the chat room and its users feel alive and were used as meaningful concepts for the plot, like when one of the murderers had a perfect alibi for their "turn" because the murder occured during a video chat session where they were discussing a different murder. Manics however is a bit different from the previous volumes. It's definitely not considered the "3.0" of the series, more like a side story. That's obvious immediately when you see the actual physical book, because it's barely half the size of the previous volumes and the contents too are considerably weaker than the full-sized volumes: usually all five characters get a chance to act as quizmaster, but in this volume, we only have like two-and-a-half case to solve.

The opening story Q1: Rokuninme no Tanteishi ("Q1: The Sixth Detective") is by far the strongest story of the whole volume. Over the course of nine uploaded videos to a major video streaming site, we see the usual five participants in the chat room: The Mad Header wearing their Darth Vader mask, aXe with a hockey mask, Zangya-kun and their turtle, Professor Ban Douzen with sunglasses and an afro and the silhouetted torso of 044APD. It's aXe's turn and he reveals he has killed a tech writer called Idei Kenichi in his studio apartment in Tokyo. On the night of Idei's murder, his neighbors and downstairs neigbor heard a loud noise from the apartment. The downstairs neighbor thought it a bit strange and when Idei didn't answer the door both at night and the following morning, the neigbor decided to notify the owner of the apartment building and when they entered the locked apartment, they found both a toppled bookcase and Idei lying on the floor. He had been hit fatally on the back of his head, but the door and all the windows had been locked from inside and the police is inclined to rule it an accident. However, this was a genuine murder committed by aXe, but the locked room isn't the only problem the others have to solve. For on the night of the evening, aXe had also been videochatting with Zangya-kun and 044APD and those two saw live how aXe had been driving around all the way in Nagoya and that he had been stopped by the police and fined there for using his phone to videochat while driving. So how could aXe have committed the locked room murder in Tokyo at the same time he was being presented his one-of-a-kind fine in Nagoya?

The new plot about these chat sessions being uploaded on a video streaming site adds a weird new dynamic to this series, as we are introduced to a new character: Sagashima Yukio is an ordinary fan of mystery fiction who is absolutely fascinated by these videos a friend sent him, and like any true mystery fan, Sagashima too tries to figure out aXe's murder scheme (not realizing that countless of other people on the web have seen these videos already and that the web's drowning in theories written by everyone). The concept of a third party trying to solve the case serves as the overall storyline for this volume (previous volumes, while short story collections, also worked towards a climax in a way). The case itself is... perhaps a bit simple, but a lot of it does make good use of the unique story setting, justifying the shakier parts of the plot. The way the locked room itself is made is a very modern variant on an otherwise very, very old way to create a locked room, and that also holds for the actual murder method (the murder weapon is also part of the mystery). The underlying concepts are pretty corny, but the variations are undoubtedly very, very modern and yet realistic, making use of normal objects we consumers can buy. aXe's trick with which he got hold of their alibi for the murder is basically an extension of the ideas seen in the actual murder and as a whole, one can definitely say aXe's 'quiz' has a clearly defined theme, even if the actions he actually took were surprisingly simple.What I did really like however was when the weaker points to the plot were shown: Utano makes clear that what is usually considered to be a weak point in an attempt to create a locked room murder, doesn't hold for this particular setting and he makes a convincing argument. The result is that Utano is able to create locked room murder situations that a reader might usually dismiss as unrealistic or unreliable, but which do make sense in the context of this series, allowing for pretty unique murders.

Q2: Hontou ni Mienai Otoko ("Q2: The True Invisible Man") also consists of two problems, but unlike aXe's problem, this story revolves around two unrelated murders, though tied by the theme of "the invisible man." The first murder victim of The Mad Header was Honnouji Haruka, a stage actress who had a solo act in a small theatre for three days. She was murdered between the afternoon and night act of her last day, but nobody saw the killer walk in or out of her dressing room. When one of the receptionists came to deliver some flowers sent to Haruka, they found her lying dead in her dressing room. But for the last three quarters of an hour, while Haruka was still alive and overheard rehearsing in her dressing room, both sides of the little hallway in front of her dressing room was watched by the props man backstage on one side, and the receptionists on the other side. The second problem is set at a tech lab in a university, where one of the students was sitting at one of the desk in the back of the lab. Other students were sitting at the front side of the lab, but couldn't directly see the victim because of bookcases blocking the view. But while the hallway door was always in view of the other students in the lab, The Mad Header still managed to kill the victim sitting in the back of the room, without anyone noticing them. Both problems feature really lame solutions. And that's done intentionally. In previous volumes, there were always shorter intermezzo stories with joke solutions that were just silly or really outdated wedged in between the masterpieces of the volume. This story falls in that same tradition, but the problem is that this volume is really, really short and almost half of the volume is therefore used to present two locked room mysteries that were never intended to be memorable or impressive. The one in the theatre is basically a slightly updated version of a very old trick to create a locked room mystery (and Sagashima too notes this solution is pretty boring), while the university murder borders on science-fiction, being reliant on a very specific type of technology that may or may not exist. In the previous volumes, these kind of problems were usually posed by Professor Ban Douzen as fictional time-wasters while waiting for the actual problem, but it's just disappointing to see almost half of the volume dedicated to this.

Q3: Soshite Dare Mo Inakatta ("Q3: And There Were None") and the follow-up story don't even really have a locked room murder mystery to solve, but tie up the overall story of the person who's been uploading the chat sessions on video streaming sites. Professor Ban Douzen wants to switch things up a bit and not tell the other participants about the murder afterwards, but have them participate in real-time. He has started a live video stream of their chat room, showing the familiar chat windows of the five in one window. In the stream, we can also see Professor Ban Douzen has posted the other four others at specific locations surrounding a certain building. A sixth chat window is also visible on the screen, which shows a man in a bathrobe. X is to be the victim and he is present in a room in the surrounded building. Professor Ban Douzen claims he'll be able to kill X even with aXe, Zangya-kun, The Mad Header and 044APD standing near all the exits/vital points and he dares them to stop him either going in or out. I won't go on, because that would definitely spoil the surprise, but let's just say this isn't really a locked room murder mystery anymore. The story is used to spring a surprise on the reader regarding the uploaded videos of the chat sessions and how these three cases relate to each other in secret, and there's some admittedly interesting meta-musings going on, but it feels like a concept that should have had a full volume to build up to. Now the build-up to the 'punchline' feels lacking, and you're left with a story that might have been more, but which feels imcomplete and rushed.

Misshitsu Satsujin Game - Maniacs is not touted as a full-fledged third volume in this series, but even as a side-story, it feels lacking. There's basically only one single serious locked room murder story here and while I think it could've served perfectly as an opening story for any of the volumes, I don't think it's impressive enough to be basically carrying this whole volume, which is, sadly enough, what it has to do, as the remaining stories lack the depth and originality we have learned to expect after the previous two volumes. There are some interesting ideas here that the book tries to explore by making these video chats public and having a third party attempt solving them, but as this book is really short, there's simply no room to work out any of these ideas into something substantial. I hope that we'll see a full-fledged 3.0 volume in the future, because I wouldn't want this to be the end of a series after the previous two high points.

Original Japanese title(s): 歌野晶午『密室殺人ゲーム・マニアックス』   

Name of the Game

"I live in the games. I search through systems, peoples, and cities, for this place."

"Reboot"

The last few years have seen an uprising on blogs on mystery fiction, and it has led to a small ecosphere, where people talk about their love for the genre over the internet. Often, the discussions will be about specific works or authors, but sometimes, you'll also see discussions on the best locked room murder trick, or how a murderer made a stupid mistake in an otherwise flawless plan, and at other times, these people will not only try to compete with a book author and the fictional detective in "a battle of the wits", but also with fellow people on the internet, with detective games or puzzles. But all of that is still peanuts compared to today's book.

Somewhere in a back alley of the internet, you'll find a small private video chat group populated by a colorful lot. "The Mad Header", "044APD", "aXe", "Zangya-kun" and "Professor Ban Douzen" are not ordinary people. That is not only because they use voice changers or wear funny masks like that of Darth Vader (The Mad Header) or Jason Voorhees (aXe). It's also not just because they love mystery fiction. This group is not ordinary, because they play a certain game. Once in a while, the group comes together to play a game of intellect: one member has to pose a locked room murder problem to the others, who will need to solve it using the available hints. But the catch is that the host of the problem must commit their locked room murder in real life. So the participants need to solve a real life locked murder, using the information gain from the news, as well as any additional information or hints provided by the host. Eternal glory awaits those who manage to solve a locked room murder, or who manages to mystify their fellow members. Utano Shougo's Misshitsu Satsujin Game 2.0 ("Locked Room Murder Game 2.0", 2009) details a new series of linked short stories about these ingenous, yet monstrous games of deduction.

I read the first Misshitsu Satsujin Game back in 2015 (the review wasn't posted until 2016 because of timey-wimey stuff) and it became one of my favorite reads of the year. It was not only highly entertaining as a short story collection focusing on locked room murders (some of them were really brilliant): the whole set-up of the tale, as well as the characters were memorable. The video web chat setting was not just a gimmick, but was used to its fullest, leading to surprising developments. One fine example was one member having an alibi for their locked murder, as they were busy video-chatting with the others during the murder in an earlier story! The characters, despite only interacting through webcams and hiding behind masks and avatars, were also incredibly lively, each with a distinct personality and way of talking, resulting in very entertaining chat sessions, making the whole book an absolute delight to read. So it was only a matter of time before I'd come back to the world of the Locked Room Murder Games.

For those who have read the first book and are wondering: at first the connection between that book and this one might seem a bit odd considering how that one ended, but a proper explanation is given over the course of the stories. The plot structure for most stories is fairly similiar: a host details the murder they committed, supplying some additional details about the victim and murder with pictures and videos they took of their deed, followed by several chat sessions where the participants propose solutions while bantering and bickering a lot. Occasionally, the chat sessions are interrupted by moments where we see the participants trying to gain more information in real life, for example by questioning the witnesses themselves or visiting the crime scenes in person. Each story is an entertaining read as all the participants keep throwing their thoughts at each other, constantly developing the plot further.

Q1: Tsugi Wa Dare Ga Koroshimasu Ka? ("Q1: Who Is Going To Kill Next?") starts with a surprising statement to the police by a young man who got arrested on suspicion of a series of murders. He only wrote down a series of numbers, mentioning only that this was all a game. "The Mad Header", "044APD", "aXe", "Zangya-kun" and "Professor Ban Douzen" quickly deduce that the man must also be playing some kind of internet murder game, just like themselves. The people in the other group are apparently murdering their victims in similar ways, making it appear like a serial murder. Working on the assumption that the series of numbers must have some meaning to the suspect's group, our group tries to figure out what that message is, and the details behind the other killing game. As an opener, it's a bit disappointing this story isn't a locked room mystery, but basically a code-cracking story. It's a pretty good one, granted, because as the stories develops, the other game is revealed to be quite shocking, and the way 'our' group deduces that truth is fairly solid. The story also functions as a fair introduction, as we see how the members of our group each gather information in their own way: some only look at the news, while others actually go to the crime scene themselves to gain an advantage over the others. So it's a good code-cracking story, but most people won't be reading this book for a code-cracking story....

Q2: Misshitsu Nado Nai ("Q2: No Locked Room At All") is a short intermezzo, as Professor Ban Douzen tries to lighten the mood with a short locked room puzzle (so this is not a murder they actually committed). The answer to their puzzle of how a murderer managed to attack a man living in  a house that had been closed off completely is utterly ridiculous, but oddly fair, due to the careful wording. It's obviously meant as a joke problem though. A variation on the same problem is offered with a more serious solution, which is better, but again, this is just light stuff compared to the actual murders they commit.

Q3: Kirisaki Jack Sanjuppun no Kodoku ("Q3: Jack the Ripper - Thirty Minutes of Solitude") is our first genuine locked room murder of the book, and it's a gem. A man was killed inside one of the buildings he owns. His daughter found him inside one of the office rooms, but at the time of the discovery, the only office door was blocked by something on the inside, so she had to push hard before she could open it. The objects blocking the door were her father's legs: his torso was lying in the middle of the room, his stomach cut open and all his organs had been pulled out. The legs had been put against the door after it had been shut and that door is the only exit out of the office. So how did Zangya-kun commit their gruesome murder and then managed to "lock" the door with the legs? The story has a nice pace, as the group banters on about the horrible murder case and Zangya-kun keeps on provocating the others for not being able to solve their murder. It's a very tricky locked room murder too, as it even features a trap. The story is also a good showcase of how a deduction should be based on clues: at one point Zangya-kun decides to reveal a clue on purpose to help the group out, and it's that one clue that changes all the deductions up to that point, changing the problem they had been playing with in something different. The way that one clue manages to turn everything upside down is absolutely brilliant, and results in an incredibly memorable locked room mystery. This story is titled after after a Shimada Souji novel by the way.

Q4: Soutou na Akuma ("Q4: An Unbelievable Devil") is an alibi deconstruction story, as the impossibility comes from the fact that the Mad Header couldn't have committed the murder they committed. The victim had been in Osaka on the night of her murder, and while her body was found buried somewhere thereabouts, her head was found inside the refrigerator of her own apartment back in Kanagawa Prefecture, near Tokyo. The problem however is that on the day of the murder, the Mad Header held several video chat sessions with his group, one of which together with the body even. These chat sessions however place him until a certain time in Tokyo, which means it would've been impossible for him to make it all the way to Osaka in time to do his video chat session with the victim's body. So how did he manage to make it in time to Osaka for the murder? The solution to the alibi is a bit simple, and not really impressive, but it's in fact no the main attraction of this story: once you realize how the alibi was created, a new riddle arises of how that situation could've been orchestrated in the first place, and that's when the story ventures into very surprising areas, making excellent use of its unique setting as a web-based story. I'd say this tale is more memorable because of the latter revelation (which is really surprising) than the (ostensibly) main puzzle, and one with a really nasty aftertaste (designed on purpose). The title is a play on Arisugawa Alice's Soutou no Akuma ("Double-Headed Devil")

Q5: Mittsu no Kannuki ("Q5: The Three Latches") is named after Carr's The Three Coffins, and features a special 'coffin' with three latches. aXe's victim was stuffed inside a transparant coffin, which had been locked from the inside by three latches, and the coffin itself stood a few meters away from a lonely automobile road. Snow had also fallen that night, but no footprints were found that led to or away from the coffin. The locked coffin and the untouched snow means a double impossible situation to solve for the chat group. The solution is a bit... dissappointing isn't the right word, but I'd say less impressive than the previous efforts? The other participants make the same complaint actually, but a transparent box dumped near a road isn't that memorable, and as early on aXe admits they themselves created the box, the reader will soon suspect there's something err... to suspect about the box. The way the impossible situation was created is in practical terms okay, but it misses... imagination, I guess.

Q6: Misshitsu yo , Saraba ("Q6: Farewell, My Locked Room") is the last full story in the volume, and is all about 044APD's daring locked room murder. The person 044APD announced they'd kill was indeed found murdered, but what baffles everyone is the fact the victim was found lying dead inside an apartment he had no connections to whatsoever. One of the inhabitants of the apartment was also murdered, but she and the victim had no ties at all. Furthermore, the apartment door and windows were naturally locked, and the only entrances leading inside the building are either the emergency exits (which can't be opened from outside), or the entrance which is being watched by a guard all day, with visitors being required to sign a register. So how did 044APD manage to get their victim inside a random apartment, in a secured building? This is by far the longest story, with 044APD holding several chat sessions as nobody manages to solve the conundrum. The solution is incredibly daring, with many steps required to accomplish the impossible. This is why we read mystery fiction! The sheer imagination and audacity needed to pull this murder off is what tickles our interests! And not only does it feature several ingenious red herrings (which also take on a completely different meaning when you know the truth) that manage to send the other participants in the wrong direction, it also makes good use of the internet chat group setting again to set off some other surprises on the way. This is really a good story that combines a great locked room mystery in a natural, but meaningful way with the overall plot, setting and the characters as established in the previous stories. Definitely this volume's MVP.

The book ends with the one-page long Q?: Soshite Tobira ga Hirakereta ("Q?: And Then The Door Was Opened"), but this is nothing more than a teaser for the third book in the series.

Like the first volume, Misshitsu Satsujin Game 2.0 proves to be a great locked room murder short story collection. The combination of a "modern" setting like a video chatroom (used to its fullest!), with a incredible cast of totally crazy people who commit murders for their own entertainment, and incredibly imaginative locked room murders means that this second volume is a gem too in the genre. There's so much goods going on here, from genuinely captivating conversations to surprising plot twists and usage of the web-setting, that I can only recommend Misshitsu Satsujin Game 2.0 wholeheartedly. The one minus point I could give it, is the fact that it resembles the first volume a lot, so it lacks the initial shock, but this is still a very good book.

Original Japanese title(s): 歌野昌午　『密室殺人ゲーム2.0』

The Game Is On

"Move according to the rules or it's the end of the day."

"What is Reality?" (Batman: The Animated Series)

I remember seeing this book in Japanese bookstores so often and me picking it up to look at it when the pocket version was released in 2010 but the title never really appealed to me, so it always ended with me putting it back on the pile. Fast forward several years, when I'm asked specifically about this title and going through the reviews, it appeared the book was actually well received. And then it took another couple of years before I actually got the book myself.

Misshitsu Satsujin Game - Oute Hishatori ("Locked Room Murder Game - The King & Rook Check", 2007) is a linked short story collection by Utano Shougo and stars a group of five persons with unlikely names. "The Mad Header", "044APD", "aXe", "Zangya-kun" and "Professor Ban Douzen" know each other only from their private chat group, with masks and voice-scramblers hiding each of their faces/voices whenever they appear on the webcam. They come together once in a while to play a murder game of intellect: one member has to pose a problem of crime (involving murder), which the others have to solve. The murder cases they have to solve are not about whodunit, but other problems like how it was done. As for why they don't have to solve whodunit, even though it's usually the first thing you'd want to know in a murder story: the host of the current problem has also be the person to have committed the murder in real life. The problem posed are thus all murders that really happened. And so these five pass the time by solving, and committing murders...

The oute hishatori subtitle of the book is a move in shougi, that puts both the ou (king) and hisha (flying chariot, or "rook") in check. I am not familiar with shougi, but like in chess, losing the king means losing the game, and the hisha/rook is apparently one of the most useful pieces of the games, so in terms of 'painfulness', the oute hishatori would be like having both the king and queen in danger. The subtitle is also just slightly relevant to the whole book by the way.

Misshitsu Satsujin Game is one of Utano Shougo's better known books, as well as the first book in the series (which is three books long at the moment). It's definitely a fun book to read: here we have a group of detective fiction readers who have 'outgrown' simple fiction and now want to solve real murders, as well as commit them. Yet they are still very clearly fans of mystery fiction and the problems they pose to the others are alway fair-play: they give all the necessary information to solve the conundrum of the week (or the information is available from the news, as the murders all really happened). A large portion of the book is carried by the bantering of the characters and they really come alive through their chat sessions, each having their own quirks and distinct personalities.

Q1: Tsugi wa Dare wo Koroshimasuka? ("Q1: Who Will I Kill Next?") introduces the reader to the characters and the concept of the secret chat group. And the book starts off with a very spectacular serial murder case with people from all genders and various ages being murdered. "aXe", host of the problem, sends the other members photogaphs of the crime scenes and poses the following question: who is going to die next? The problem is thus one of finding the missing link between the seemingly random victims. The solution is, at the core, a rather simple one in a missing link story, but there are just enough twists and traps laid down to keep it from being too obvious. And heck, a lot of people die before the other members even suspect the connection between the victims.

Q2: Suiri Game wa Yoru wo Fukete ("Q2: A Deduction Game, All Night Long") and Q6: Kyuukyoku no Hanninnate wa Kono Ato Sugu! ("Q6: The Ultimate Whodunit, Right After The Commercial!") are two very short intermezzo howdunits: Q2 is about a murder commited in one train, while the murderer was in another. The solution is incredibly simple, which is also pointed out in the story itself. Q6 is about a murder in a sauna, and has a variation of a very classic trick. The variant itself is also starting to become rather overdone nowadays, so again, just filler material.

The problem of Q3: Namakubi ni Kiitemiru? ("Q3: How About Asking The Head?") is, in a broad sense, a locked room mystery. A man was found decapitated in his room. His head was placed on a vase, while his torso was taken outside and dumped in a park. The problem: the street leading to the victim's apartment building was under construction, and none of the construction workers there saw someone (=the murderer) carry a torso away, so how did the murderer make his escape? This was a great story: while the basic locked room mystery is not that complex, the story does include a lot of cool 'gimmicks' that make it quite memorable, and it's also the first story in the volume to be set at two levels: the actual murder, as well as the chat sessions, as the murderer actually has an alibi for the murder, as he was chatting with the others in the previous story!

Q4: Ho Chi Minh - Hamanako 5000 Kilo no Kabe ("Q4: The 5000 Kilometer Wall Between Ho Chi Minh - Lake Hamanako") is a classic alibi trick story: how could someone who was in Ho Chi Minh City, commit a murder in a rural highway service area in Japan the following day, if there are no planes flying between Ho Chi Minh City and the local airport that day? The solution is not particular difficult, but the hinting is actually done very well and even when everything is solved, this story has a bit more to offer that ties in with the end of the book.

In Q5: Kyuudousha no Misshitsu ("A Seeker's Locked Room"), the group has to find out how "044APD" managed to kill a man in his bedroom. In a house with the latest security system. In a walled housing complex with guards at every entrance. The 'absolutely safe' new housing complex appears to be a little bit less than absolutely safe because of "044APD's" daring deed, but evidence shows that "044APD" was able to make his way inside the victim's house several times before actually commiting the murder. The solution is daring and memorable, and the whole show is made even more effective because of the way the whole story is hinted (which already started in earlier stories). Probably the best story of the whole volume, but much of it comes from the way it ties in to the other stories.

Q7: Misshitsu De Wa Naku, Alibi De Mo Naku ("Q7: Neither a Locked Room, Nor An Alibi") is at first sight rather like the previous story: a man was killed in the toilet of his apartment room, in an apartment building with security. Yet, as the story unfolds, we discover that this problem has a lot more to offer than that. The problem itself is not very difficult to solve, I think, but it works very well in the context of the book. The surprise of this story is made so much bigger because it's chapter seven, because we've gone through all of the other murders in the previous stories. Q7 is thus a brilliantly planned one, that manages to bring the most out of what basically should have been much more boring and simple.

The last story, Q?, has a title I don't want to spoil, but is very different in tone from the other stories. In fact, it is an incomplete story and literally ends with the words to be continued. It's like Utano couldn't think of a good ending and decided to throw a bomb at the cast to create a cliffhanger so he could get more readers for the next book. It's forced and it doesn't really add anything good. A really disappointing ending to an otherwise great book.

The use of (anonymous) chat groups as a plot device is not particularly new, but the last few years it's been of special interest of course. One of the Kindaichi Shounen no Jikenbo novels from 1996 was also about an offline meeting of a group of mystery fiction readers, and Detective Conan too had a story about an offline meeting of a magicians chat group (volume 20). You'd think that by now, we'd have more classic puzzle plot stories that make use of ideas like internet alibis or anonymity, but most of them appear to be still stuck in the past, trying to sell the "X wasn't X, he was just using a different name on the internet!" as a surprise twist.

Save for the disappointing ending, Misshitsu Satsujin Game - Oute Hishatori was a great book. The concept of the murder club is fun, as well as the fact that it avoided the more obvious problem of whodunit in favor of howdunits. It's also a great excercise in linked short stories, as little pieces from one story would carry over to the next story and actually be part of the whole deduction process. If you have the chance to read it, I definitely recommend it and I myself will probably continue reading the series. 

Original Japanese title(s):　歌野昌午『密室殺人ゲーム　王手飛車取り』

「Why Why どうしよう 嫌われそうなこのいとしさ」

「気に入った相手を見つけるのは、得意だった。相手に気に入ってもらうのが不得意だった」

『０の殺人』

"It wasn't hard finding someone he liked. It was harder to be liked by someone"

"The 0 Murders"

 Animal Crossing... eating... my...time. Must...resist...

Shiroi Ie no Satsujin ("The White House Murders") is the second book by Utano Shougo, one of the first writers of the new orthodox movement. It is also the second book in the three-part House series, which feature the detective Shinano George solving mysteries involving, well, houses. So in that sense, you'd expect it to be a bit like Ayatsuji Yukito's Yakata (mansion) series, but as I have only read this novel by Utano, I can't comment too much on that yet (yes, Utano is like a gigantic black hole in my reading, especially as I focus on early new orthodox!). But in contrast to the Yakata series, the murders in the book aren't even really connected to the titular white house strangely enough. In the mountains of Yatsugatake lies the villa of the wealthy Ikari family. Next to it, the titular white house, home to Tatsuya, eldest son of the current head of the family and also a believer in Zoroastrianism. As always, the family is gathered here for Christmas. This year the tutor of Shizuka, daughter of the current head of the family, is also present, as Shizuka has to prepare for the entry exams for university. Things go their way, until one night Shizuka is found strangled. And not only strangled, but also hung upside down from the ceiling, inside her own, locked, bedroom. The Ikari family however has very bad experiences with the police and media and hope to hush up Shizuka's murder, as well as find/punush the murderer themselves. Shizuka's tutor suggest hiring Shinano George, a personal friend who happens to be a private detective, who is promptly called for.

The set-up feels strangely close to Natsuki Shizuko's W no Higeki, but quickly goes a different direction, by the way.

What to say about Shiroi Ie no Satsujin. I won't outright say it is a bad novel, but... there were too many times I had to say "close.... but not enough". For starters, we have the locked room murder of Shizuka, but there was actually no coherent reason for the murderer to go through all that trouble. Sure, it is an interesting trick (I have seen it elsewhere before, though I don't know where the original trick first came from), but it seemed more like the murderer (= author) just wanted to use the trick, without coming up with a good reason for actually employing it. And technically, the trick wouldn't even work the way it is described in the book (as you can see from the actual maps included in the book!).

The same with the final murder (yes, there are multiple murders in this novel), which involves a body lying in a snowfield with no footprints nearing it. Once again, a trick that can work in the right circumstances (and once again, a variation on something I have seen often), but Utano can't convince me that employing this trick was necessary, or even beneficary to the cause of the murderer. Especially as the trick itself only works if you can guarantee nobody is going to enter the snowfield, leaving footprints. And considering that these two murders/tricks are actually also the clues to point to who the murderer is... It's really as if the murderer was just saying, yes, it was me all along!

The whole novel feels like a collection of ideas with good intention, but bad execution. The book starts with a map of the mansion? Too bad you don't actually need them. The same with the amount of effort that went into the maps of the locked room (which was cute, but again, not needed at all). A character practicing Zoroastrianism? Not bad on its own, but again, it has so little influence on the whole story, that I have to ask the question, was this needed? Why tell me about Zoroastrianism if it matters so little to the overall plot? Why is the title "The White House Murders", if two of the murders happen inside the main villa, while the other takes places just outside the white house? Why set the story in a mountain villa at all, if they keep going up and down in their cars there? Why does it take ages for characters to realize the flaws in their own deductions, even though it's a flaw at the most fundamental level?! And after a while, you just stop caring.

New orthodox novels / writers tend to be very aware of the tropes of classic detective fiction, using them like they did back then, but they are also aware of their flaws, thus also repositioning / adjusting them for use in modern days. In Shiroi Ie no Satsujin, I can see that Utano knows his grammar, he knows the tropes of the genre, but the implementation of it is... not quite right. It's like hearing someone speaking a foreign language imperfectly, the individual parts are grammatically correct, but somewhere, it feels wrong because of the intonation or a particular word order which isn't wrong per se, but not natural.

So no, I wouldn't recommend this novel. Not sure how Utano's other novels are, but I have to say that he has dropped quite hard on the priority list.

Original Japanese title(s): 歌野昌午　『白い家の殺人』