Newcomer

September 10, 2018
In Higashino’s satisfying second novel featuring Kyoichiro Kaga to be published in English (after 2014’s Malice), the Columbo-like Tokyo police detective pursues loose ends in the case of the strangulation murder of Mineko Mitsui, a divorcee estranged from her only child, whose friends insisted that “she was the last person on earth to have enemies.” Kaga believes that his responsibilities as a homicide investigator extend to finding ways to comfort those traumatized by violent crime. He begins with a family that runs a store that sells rice crackers to ascertain whether an insurance salesman who claimed he was in Mineko’s apartment shortly before her death on business had an alibi. Other threads include the identity of the person who bought an assortment of pastries found at the scene of the crime, and why the dead woman purchased an expensive pair of kitchen scissors. Although the solution is less elaborate than those in the author’s Detective Galileo novels, the end result is a police procedural puzzle mystery that comes across as more realistic.

October 1, 2018
Unorthodox Tokyo detective Kyoichiro Kaga (introduced in Malice?, 2014) has been reassigned to the Nihonbashi precinct and is still acquainting himself with the quaint premodern neighborhood when another newcomer, Mineko Mitsui, is found strangled in her apartment. The savvy killer has left no trace of himself, leaving Kaga and the lead detective, Uesugi, to mine clues from the inconsistencies of Mineko's last day. While Uesugi employs more direct questioning, Kaga unexpectedly pops up into Nihonbashi's traditional Japanese shops, where his seemingly simple questions unmask family secrets, hidden loyalties, and heartbreak. In Kaga's capable hands, a box of wasabi-laced sweets, a pair of kitchen shears, a witness' incongruous statement, Mineko's last visit to her regular pastry shop, and a child's toy become breadcrumbs leading to a killer. Kaga's second investigation is a cerebral puzzler's delight that, like Alexander McCall Smith's No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency mysteries, offers a thought-provoking take on the tension between modernity and traditional culture and leaves a trail of mended relationships in its wake.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2018, American Library Association.)

Starred review from September 15, 2018
Demoted back to local policing from the Tokyo Metropolitan Police Department's Homicide Division, Kyochiro Kaga (Malice, 2014) makes a deep impression on the quiet Nihonbashi Precinct.The girl at the rice cracker shop is probably the first to notice Kaga's novel approach to investigation. Rather than focusing on the crime scene in Kodenmacho where Mineko Mitsui was found strangled in her apartment, Kaga begins by looking at the rhythms of the street. Why do businessmen walking from the Hamacho neighborhood to the Ningyocho subway station still have their jackets on, while the men coming from Ningyocho have them slung over their shoulders? Naho Kamikawa, the shopkeeper's granddaughter, feigns indifference as she sits sipping her banana juice with Kaga, but still she's impressed at his perceptiveness. So are Yoriko, owner of a traditional restaurant down the street, and Akifumi, the apprentice at irascible Mr. Terada's clock shop. As author Higashino describes Kaga's incursion into the lives he finds at each of the street's small shops, he seems to be crafting a chain of tiny, gemlike short stories--until the tales start intersecting, scaffolding on one another, and eventually creating a bridge between the lives of the longtime residents of Kodenmacho and the death of a woman who, for her own private reasons, chose to live in this obscure quarter of one of the world's busiest cities.Part Sherlock Holmes, part Harry Bosch, Higashino's hero is a quietly majestic force to be reckoned with. Here's hoping his demotion continues to bring him to the attention of readers from East to West.

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September 15, 2018

In this latest by seasoned suspense author Higashino (Under the Midnight Sun; The Devotion of Suspect X), Detective Kaga visits local business owners to learn who murdered Mineko Mitsui, a recent transplant to the Nihonbashi area of Tokyo. Instead of fading into the background as Kaga gets closer to the truth, these shopkeepers form the core of the novel--think a Law & Order episode dominated by the quiet dramas of the bit players. Most of their lives touched Mineko's only briefly, if at all, yet each gives Kaga a clearer picture of the woman and reveals that beneath its sedate surface, Nihonbashi bubbles with family secrets, joys, and pains. Though the discovery of the murderer's identity isn't shocking, the journey there is rewarding. Readers seeking a thriller full of abrupt twists and grisly violence may be disappointed, but many will appreciate Higashino's graceful prose and willingness to push the limits of the genre. VERDICT For fans of the author, Seicho- Matsumoto, and other writers of deliberately paced mysteries. [See Prepub Alert, 5/14/18; "Editors' Fall Picks," LJ 8/18.]--Mahnaz Dar, Library Journal

Copyright 2018 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

September 15, 2018

Just transferred to a new precinct in the Nihonbashi area of Tokyo, Det. Kyochiro Kaga of the Tokyo Police Department is assigned to a team investigating the murder of a woman who seems to have enemies everywhere. From Japan's best-selling novelist, an Edgar finalist.

Copyright 2017 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.