The Tokyo Zodiac Murders

<b>One of <i>The Guardian</i>’s “Top 10 Locked Room Mysteries”</b><br> <b> </b><br> <b>An amateur detective races to solve a decades-old murder mystery in this “bloody and bizarre” Japanese crime novel with a twist hailed as “one of the most original” (<i>Daily Mail</i>).</b><br><br> Astrologer, fortune teller, and self-styled detective Kiyoshi Mitarai must solve a macabre murder mystery that has baffled Japan for 40 years—in just one week. <br>  <br> With the help of his freelance illustrator friend, Kiyoshi sets out to answer the questions that have haunted the country ever since: Who murdered the artist Umezawa, raped and killed his daughter, and then chopped up the bodies of six others to create Azoth, ‘the perfect woman’?<br>  <br> With maps, charts, and other illustrations, this story of magic and illusion—pieced together like a great stage tragedy—challenges the reader to unravel the mystery before the final curtain falls.<br>  <br> This quintessential Japanese “logic mystery”—eerie, gory, and intriguing—combines the puzzle-solving of Golden Age Western detective fiction with elements of shocking horror and dark humor.