Tokyo Zodiac Murders began with a confessional journal entry from the supposed killer. Heikichi Umezawa was an artist obsessed with astrology/alchemy/the occult and making Japan great again, and he was able to combine his two passions by bringing forth the goddess Azoth. He thought the best way to go about it was to sacrifice his six daughters and nieces and use their "best" body parts to form his demented masterpiece!
Ooookay then. I was somewhat put off as I thought Tokyo Zodiac Murders would be a straightforward locked room murder mystery without involving incestuous crimes or deviant sexual behaviour. After Grotesque, I wasn't exactly keen on reading more transgressive fiction about aberrant desires and women being victims of sexual violence. But whatever, my already disturbed mind can handle it.
But after that first chapter, the narrative shifted to two men in present day Tokyo (c.1979) trying to solve this cold case from the 1930s: Kazumi Ishioka, a freelance illustrator and avid mystery fan, and his friend, astrologer Kiyoshi Mitarai.
There were three murders to solve: the locked room mystery of Heikichi Umezawa (who was murdered in his studio), his eldest daughter Kazue (who was murdered in her home), and the six Umesawa women (whose bodies were found in various locations in Japan over the course of a year).
I've read enough mysteries to not devote too much mental energy to figuring out who the real murderer was because the author controls how the information is revealed to the reader. Towards the end though, I was surprised to discover that author Soji Shimada broke the fourth wall by addressing the reader. It was clever and cute, and I instantly regretted not paying more attention while reading! I could only assure myself that in order for someone like yours truly to solve the case, I would've had to take additional time to pore over the details that were provided. In hindsight, all the clues were indeed there, but you had to review everything and it would've been more fun if a friend had been reading the book at the same time so that we could compare notes. However, I did at some point deduce enough to hazard a guess... major spoilers ahead!
It was after Detective Takegoshi's letter of confession that I deduced that the murderer was likely a woman, after all. This was why the suspect had to force a policeman to help bury the bodies. Not only would a woman not have been physically capable of disposing the bodies in the remote locations, one of the amateur detectives had stated women weren't allowed to have driver's licenses back then. I had also assumed Kazue was probably coerced into having sex with him and was killed afterwards, since semen was found inside her when in fact, she had been killed prior to that. I had also thought the killer must've been one of the daughters, but then I was stymied by the fact that all six bodies had been found. I didn't make the leap that their bodies might have been incorrectly identified, since this was long before DNA testing was possible. The bodies had also been cut up and each body was only discovered over the course of a year, so some of the bodies were already in an advanced state of decomposition.
So there was very good reason for the novel to begin with the deranged confession of the supposed murderer. The first chapter was the red herring, and I fell for it! I also appreciated Tokiko's backstory (she was Heikichi's first daughter from his first marriage). What if Cinderella decided she was done with being a doormat and took out her evil stepmother and stepsisters? Tokiko was a vengeful Cinderella yet also a tragic figure, because the person she was doing this for, her mother, still ended up lonely and sad. She also lost out on time spent with her mother while she was making her elaborate plans.
One highlight from the novel: a reference to the real 1936 murder case involving Sada Abe, a geisha and prostitute who strangled her lover to death and was carrying his severed gentialia in her kimono when she was found by police.
Note: I found this secondhand copy of Tokyo Zodiac Murders at Walen Pond Books, Oakland. This book was also in Olman's list, which reminds me - I should pass this onto him.
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