Japanese Mystery

WATERSTONES BEST FICTION BOOKS OF 2023 PICK The Kamogawa Food Detectives, translated from Japanese by Jesse Kirkwood, is the first book in the bestselling, mouth-watering Japanese sleuthing series for fans of Before the Coffee Gets Cold. What’s the one dish you’d do anything to taste just...

Brought to you by Penguin. A thrilling crime classic, from the bestselling author of Tokyo Express Tokyo, 1960. As the first rays of morning light hit the rails at Kamata Station, a man’s body is found on the tracks. With only two leads – a distinctive accent and a single word, ‘kameda’...

As they do every year, a small group of acquaintances pay a visit to the remote castle-like Water Mill House, home to the reclusive Fujinuma Kiichi, son of a famous artist, who has lived his life behind a rubber mask ever since a disfiguring car accident. This year, however, the visit is disrupted by an impossible disappearance, the theft of a painting, and a series of baffling murders. The brilliant Kiyoshi Shimada arrives to investigate.

Brought to you by Penguin. Chris Harding's enormously enjoyable new book distils Japan's long, complex and fascinating history into the stories of twenty remarkable individuals. These vivid and entertaining portraits take the reader from the earliest written accounts of Japan right through to...

Award-winning novelist Michael Pronko examines Tokyo as a place, a culture, and a series of intense experiences, with humor, delicacy, and enchantment. More than just a setting for novels and films, Tokyo is a lively, interactive space that constantly pops up questions: How do you sweat politely, in Tokyo’s sweltering summers? How do you glance sideways, on crowded trains? How do homeowners transform a sliver of space into an impeccable garden? The answers are not what one might expect.

In the winter of 1937, the village of Okamura is abuzz with excitement over the forthcoming wedding of a son of the grand Ichiyanagi family. But amid the gossip over the approaching festivities, there is also a worrying rumour - it seems a sinister masked man has been asking questions about the Ichiyanagis around the village. Then, on the night of the wedding, the Ichiyanagi family are woken by a terrible scream, followed by the sound of eerie music - death has come to Okamura, leaving no trace but a bloody samurai sword, thrust into the pristine snow outside the house.

内容紹介
郷田三郎はこの世の全てに面白さを感じることが無く退屈しきっていた。

Early working copy, not final, translated ms delivered Jan 2026. If I hadn't searched for the 'flavors' of my memories, I think I would have spent my life endlessly chasing the past." Near Higashi Honganji Temple in Kyoto, Kamogawa Diner continues to attract lost souls seeking meaning in their...

Emma Hooper thought coming home to small-town life and the family farm would give her a chance to rest and recover from a traumatic accident. But that was before she started seeing ghosts. It was before Grandma Hooper started singing on the roof, and it was way, way before anybody spotted a ghost in a 19th-century cavalry uniform coming out of an outhouse. Can Emma learn to handle her newfound ability to see spirits, while figuring out a confusing relationship with the handsome local doctor? All while solving the ghastly murder of Preacher Jacob? 

Brought to you by Penguin Flo is sick of Tokyo. Suffering from a crisis in confidence, she is stuck in a rut, her translation work has dried up and she's in a relationship that's run its course. That's until she stumbles upon a mysterious book left by a fellow passenger on the Tokyo Subway. From...

Brought to you by Penguin. Shogun meets Sherlock Holmes! Over 24 million copies have been sold of this beloved samurai adventure It has been half a year since Akiyama Daijiro became a samurai; half a year since he left his father Kohei – once the most skilled swordsman in the land – to set...

Two people die in hot spring towns in different parts of Japan from hydrogen sulfide poisoning. Investigating the case is geochemist Shusuke Aoe, who witnessed the same mysterious girl, Madoka, at both crime scenes… A science fiction mystery that challenges established norms of the genre...

ミイラ化した死体は何を語る？ 引きこもりを抱えた家族を襲う悲劇。 彼らは被害者か、それとも――。 光崎教授が抉り出す、深い闇とは? 死体は嘘を吐かない――傑作法医学ミステリー第５弾！ 家族はどこで一線を越えてしまったのか 浦和医大法医学教室にミイラ化した遺体が運び込まれた。

Brought to you by Penguin. While on a business trip to Kobe, Tsuneo Asai receives the news that his wife Eiko has died of a heart attack. Eiko had a heart condition so the news of her death wasn't totally unexpected. But the circumstances of her demise left Tsuneo, a softly spoken government...

From bestselling author of If Cats Disappeared from the World comes a taut psychological mystery based on a real-life crime for fans of Butter and Diary of a Void. She works quietly in a coastal shipyard office, barely noticed by those around her. Life passes in grey repetition until one day, on...

※本作品は2026年9月3日に徳間書店より刊行予定です 〈どんでん返しの帝王〉が放つ新シリーズ! 緊迫の警察×心理ミステリー 「戦場に物的証拠は存在しない」 年がら年中、人を殺す方法ばかり考えているミステリー書きが絶えず念頭に置いていたテーマがこれだ。

「持つ者は子宝に恵まれる」と江戸で評判の宝船の絵。しかし赤子を失ったある家の宝船の絵から、弁財天が消えたという。 深川の富勘長屋に住み、岡っ引き修業に励む北一は、噂の真相を確かめようと奔走する。

二人の「きたさん」が事件に翻弄されつつ成長していく物語で、著者が「生涯、書き続けたい」と願う捕物帖。 舞台は江戸深川。一人目の「きたさん」こと北一は、亡くなった岡っ引き・千吉親分の本業だった文庫(本や小間物を入れる箱)売りで生計を立てている。

Japanese Tales of Mystery & Imagination, the first volume of its kind translated into English, is written with the quick tempo of the West but rich with the fantasy of the East. These nine bloodcurdling, chilling tales present a genre of literature largely unknown to people outside Japan, including the strange story of a quadruple amputee and his perverse wife; the record of a man who creates a mysterious chamber of mirrors and discovers hidden pleasures within; the morbid confession of a maniac who envisions a career of foolproof "psychological" murders…

【シリーズ第9巻】 児童書で史上初！2024年、本屋大賞にノミネートした『放課後ミステリクラブ１ 金魚の泳ぐプール事件』シリーズ、ついに第9巻！ 今回は「カブトムシ」のミステリ！ 夏の林間学校。飼っていたカブトムシがひっくり返って死んでいた。