Cannonball Read 18

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

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A Couple of Fine Mysteries

Murder at the Black Cat Cafe by Seishi Yokomizo

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Rating: 3 Stars In a nutshell: In two separate, unrelated mysteries, the victim isn’t entirely clear. Best for: Fans of this genre – Yokomizo is a famous author of Japanese mysteries. Quote that made me think: N/A Why I chose it: It was a gift from my partner for my birthday. Review: Both of these stories focus on the idea that we might not be entirely sure of who the victim is. In the first, a woman’s body is found in the back garden of […]

Not What You Expect To Happen in a Locked Room on Your Wedding Night

The Honjin Murders by Seishi Yokomizo

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Seishi Yokomizo is, at least according to Amazon, one of Japan’s most popular mystery writers. His series of novels featuring amateur detective Kosuke Kindaichi have only recently started being published in English translations, and The Honjin Murders is the first of the series. Kenzo Ichiyanagi is a the scholarly head of his influential family, who live in a mansion in a rural village, with a separate “annexe house” on the property. Some of the family have gathered at the estate for Kenzo’s wedding to a […]

What an absolute waste of a great book cover.

Death on Gokumon Island (Detective Kosuke Kindaichi, #4) by Seishi Yokomizo

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I think I might be done with this series. It’s really lost its charm. I might give it one more go if they translate a fifth book, but it will be by hard copy not by audio. You expect a certain amount of clashing cultural mores when you read a book that was written over fifty years before, but when I read Agatha Christie, for instance, it’s usually just small stuff you can roll your eyes at and be like, ugh you dumb people in […]

The village of hysterical women.

The Village of Eight Graves (Kosuke Kindaichi, #3) by Seishi Yokomizo

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Whaaaat the heck happened here. This was a mess. In fact, I had such a different reading experience with this third translated book in the Kosuke Kindaichi series that I kind of have to wonder if it was me and not the book, since presumably the English publisher chose to translate and publish this one third out of all the many, many available books in the series for a reason (and it’s not third in original publication order). I really wasn’t expecting to have such […]

Creatively murdering people for the money. #CBRBINGO – Dough

The Inugami Curse (Detective Kosuke Kindaichi, #2) by Seishi Yokomizo

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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 […]

“‘That man’s lying.’ With that, he opened his suitcase and took out a blank telegram. After a few moments, he began to write. KATSUKO DEAD. SEND KINDAICHI.”

The Honjin Murders (Detective Kosuke Kindaichi, #1) by Seishi Yokomizo

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A clever, meta little Japanese murder mystery, first published in 1946, by a man who was apparently a huge fan of the western Golden Age mystery. This is the first book in the Kosuke Kindaichi series that he wrote dozens of novels for. Kindaichi-san is very unlike his British counterparts, Poirot, Wimsey, or even Marple. He’s very young, and a bit of a slob, but he has a mind for mysteries. Here, he is brought to the scene of a wedding where the bride and […]



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