She Walks at Night

I don't want to rate a Seishi Yokomizo book this low, but it really was one of the worst in his Kindaichi Kosuke series. It's not because of the titular character for the series, but it's because it feels as half-baked as the villain.

If you're familiar with The Murder of Roger Akroyd, this book follows a similar premise. It's something that I quite enjoy, and this feels like Yokomizo's homage to Christie (it's well-known that a lot of Japanese mystery/detective writers really liked a lot of the mystery/detective novels coming out in the decades prior to them—they're frequently mentioned even within the text).

I don't think the mystery is as well-done as Roger Akroyd, but that doesn't mean it's not worth reading. I think where it falls apart for me is that you don't see certain connections that feel somewhat necessary; I understand that the obfuscation is the point, but there are elements that I think needed to at least be addressed, even in an underhanded sort of way.

For instance, the primary motivation of this murder is a woman named Oshizu, who was in a romantic relationship with the protagonist before he went off to war (and he asked his friend to watch over her and keep her safe). For the record, she does not ask for this murder (or any of the murders) to take place. The murderer is seeking to get revenge for what his 'friend' has done (which includes raping Osizhu, prompting her to "become insane" or "go mad," and then holding her captive in a small cottage on his family's estate, followed by entering her into a nunnery near their other estate for safe-keeping).

While we know of this woman that the friend is keeping, we miss a couple crucial details that could help the reader trace these back. They don't need to be made obvious, but we don't know that the murderer (the protagonist) has ever had a relationship with anyone; we don't get a glimmer that he ever had a romance of any sort. I also don't get the feeling that he went off to war, even though I know others had. These are details that, while they can be stated through obfuscation, are necessary and feel like they were forgotten.

The only reason I started thinking early on that this was a Roger Akroyd-type novel was because everyone else felt too obvious. When Kindaichi's character is later made to tell the protagonist that he should continue his story (and without his fictions), it reminded me so much of when Poirot asked for Dr Sheppard's impressions.

Other things I wasn't fond of included was the way in which hunchbacks were talked about in the beginning; it wasn't until Kindaichi showed up in the novel that it decreased or stopped, but a good half of the book includes them making disparaging remarks about appearances, which grates on the nerves quickly. I can't tell whether that it was mostly in relation to the characters' views rather than the author's, as other characters seemed ambivalent... But there was a point where it felt so excessive, and it nearly drove me to stop reading (but I'm glad I didn't).