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Title: Inspector Imanishi Investigates by Seicho Matsumoto, Beth Cary ISBN: 0-939149-28-1 Publisher: Soho Press Pub. Date: 01 September, 1989 Format: Hardcover Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $18.95 |
Average Customer Rating: 4.2 (10 reviews)
Rating: 5
Summary: A mystery novel set in 1960s Japan.
Comment: Inspector Imanishi is trying to solve a murder with only one clue, the name Kameda. This story is a police procedural story that does a good job of showing us Japan in the 60s, where youth worships the new idols, such as young actors and musicians, and ancient heritage fights with political upheaval. The old and the new meet in post-war Japan, yet it is not thrust down our throats.
Seicho Matsumoto is writing about Japan for Japanese readers. He does not need to explain every single detail of culture and society. He does a great job because, frankly, it was published in 1961!
What you get is a fast flowing, showing-us-not-telling-us, novel of Japan and one character who has to swim through it to solve a crime. Once you pick it up you won't be able to put it down till you finish.
Rating: 4
Summary: Excellent police procedural
Comment: This is an excellent police procedural set in Japan in the early 1960s. It brings out the rigidity of traditional society, the smallness of the circles that most people move in, and the claustrophobia felt by the young and the sensitive (which doesn't include the hero, who is neither young nor sensitive). But it's also about the possibilities for remaking yourself that exist in a society still torn apart, just below the surface, by the war. A lot of lucky breaks, and some fairly far-fetched concepts, somewhat weaken the mystery part of the book, but it's well worth reading for the atmosphere alone.
Rating: 5
Summary: Superb Mystery Novel
Comment: This book had a long shelf life after my disappointment with Matsumoto's "points and lines", yet after reading it I think it belongs in the same category as Takagi's classic "tattoo murder case".
Whereas "points and lines" gave an endless regurgitation of one plot line with a whole greater than the one in our ozone layer, this book shows the author highly inspired. Here he adds layer upon layer of clues, dead ends, new venues and a surprising twist at the end. In addition we get an excellent dose of Japanese culture and politics and sublime pacing and drive.
In all this is a great mystery novel that does not feel outdated at all and shows equal rewards to mystery lovers and Japanophiles.
Keep the pages turning!
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Title: The Tattoo Murder Case by Akimitsu Takagi, Deborah Boliver Boehm ISBN: 1569471568 Publisher: Soho Press Pub. Date: 01 May, 1999 List Price(USD): $12.00 |
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Title: Honeymoon to Nowhere by Akimitsu Takagi, Sadako Mizuguchi ISBN: 1569471541 Publisher: Soho Press Pub. Date: 01 May, 1999 List Price(USD): $12.00 |
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Title: The Voice and Other Stories (Japan's Modern Writers S.) by Seicho Matsumoto, Adam Kabat ISBN: 4770019491 Publisher: Kodansha International (JPN) Pub. Date: 01 July, 1995 List Price(USD): $12.00 |
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Title: The Informer by Akimitsu Takagi, Sadako Mizuguchi ISBN: 1569472432 Publisher: Soho Press Pub. Date: 01 July, 2001 List Price(USD): $13.00 |
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Title: All She Was Worth by Miyuki Miyabe ISBN: 0395966582 Publisher: Mariner Books Pub. Date: 12 May, 1999 List Price(USD): $12.00 |
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