Preamble
If you’re interested in reading my academic work about detective and crime fiction (free PDFs available), check it out here. Or you can take a look at my short story collection of cosy mysteries featuring Victorian “lady detective” Meinir Davies; order now!
See also
These lists capture other stories and characters that I thought of as I was reading this piece. I won’t explain why, to avoid spoilers, but they’re associations and not ‘if you liked this, then you’ll love…’ recommendations!
Review
Having read quite a lot of Japanese detective fiction in translation (thanks as ever to the Pushkin Vertigo series), this seemed like an interesting departure from a theme, with a Japanese female detective to boot!
Despite the main character being Japanese, the bulk of the novel takes place in various bits of the UK, from the West Country to Cambridgeshire, in keeping with lots of Goddard’s other novels. There was something very charming in reading this after the last few books I’ve reviewed, which were based elsewhere, and the ‘corrupt businessmen’ plot has a comfortingly Pierce-Brosnan-James-Bond vibe, also familiar from other Goddard novels. So this felt cosy in a way that so-called “cosy fiction” often doesn’t feel to me, and it was great to read after Scorched Grace, which was trying to be everything but.
I enjoy Wada, the somewhat reluctant female detective, and her pragmatism, as well as the family mystery amongst the corporate crimes. She embodies many of the tropes that we see from the very beginning of the detective fiction genre and the first female detectives: she is deployed in circumstances where a woman, especially a woman of her type (approaching middle age, unobtrusive), will go unnoticed and yet can watch closely and detect. There are lots of twists and turns, as Wada and another accidental detective, Nick Miller, slowly wend their way towards each other, each uncovering parts of the puzzle.
This was well plotted, smoothly written, and a real pleasure to read. I’m looking forward to reading the sequel, The Fine Art of Uncanny Prediction (2023) when I get to it in the library backlog!
Take a look at my short story collection featuring Victorian “lady detective” Meinir Davies; order now!
Dominique Gracia 
Leave a comment