These books continue to be really good mysteries, but I don’t think I’ll ever be able to give one five stars because they’re so dated. Homophobia in this one in particular is a big issue.
Fun fact: Apparently the image on the cover of this edition is fairly pervasive in Japanese culture, the way that Marilyn Monroe standing above the subway grate in her white dress is for Americans. This Seishi Yokomizo guy was KIND OF a big deal. (This book is I think his most famous? Like the Japanese version of And Then There Were None in terms of notoriety.)
This book was just as fun of a listen for me as the first book I read from this series, The Honjin Murders. It continues to be pretty meta, with the narrator regularly directly foreshadowing events to come and commenting on how the behaviors of the characters affected future outcomes in a vague, mysterious way. The plot here centers around the death of the wealthy Inugami clan, and the strange will he left behind for his extensive family, the contents of which prompt some grizzly murders.
Since this is a Honkaku mystery, all the clues are there for you to put together, sometimes hidden in plain sight. But did I put them together? Of course not. Do you know me at all.
Kosuke Kindaichi continues to be a fun main character to follow. His head-scratching thing is a bit of a weird tic for a writer to give a character, but it seems to work and doesn’t annoy me, so I guess it doesn’t really matter. He’s clever and unorthodox in his methods (which is ironic because “honkaku” literally means orthodox, I guess because these puzzle mysteries are meant to be solvable).
I’m actually finally writing this review now because I’m about to start the third translated book in this series in a couple of days and I realized I still hadn’t put my thoughts down for this one.
CBR BINGO: Dough
This book is all about who is set to inherit a large fortune and control of an influential Japanese company. It’s all about the dough. And secret love-children, but that’s not relevant here.
