Honkaku genre in Japanese literature is like an escape room or locked room puzzle wherein all the clues are given to the reader by the writer with no surprise twists thrown in. The writer plays fair and does not try to deceive the reader. Readers are encouraged to participate in solving the mystery by applying logical skills to deduce the guilty party. It is similar to Sherlock Holmes's style of mystery-solving by using logical and analytical reasoning.
Storyline
The Tokyo Zodiac Murders belong to this Honkaku genre. The Zodiac Murders was a 40-year-old cold case that eluded and baffled all of Japan. Heikichi Umezawa, a reclusive artist was supposedly possessed by the devil and wanted to create Azoth- a perfect woman by killing and putting together bodies of six women. For this, he had picked his own daughters and nieces. The girls were murdered and their bodies were found with body parts missing. But the inexplicable part of the mystery was the fact that Umezawa was murdered before he could put his maniacal plan into action. Most of the book is a conversation between the narrator Kazumi Ishoka and his friend Kiyoshi Mitaraia self-styled detective wherein they try to analyze the clues and the pieces of evidence uncovered over the years related to the case.
My Thoughts
It's a whodunit that will leave you baffled and scratching your head in wonder. As much as I tried, I was unable to figure it out. And this I think is the most confounding element of this style of writing -expect the unexpected. Despite having all the facts in front of your eyes you are sure to miss the obvious. Since most of the book is about the conversation between Kiyoshi and Kazumi, therefore at times it gets monotonous and you wish for it to get moving. The solution given in the end by Kiyoshi is very methodical with diagrams to aid the explanation. Initially, it was difficult for me to keep track of all the Japanese names. So let go and just go with the flow. A very fascinating book that you may not want to put down.
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