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Malice is a standalone Higashino novel, at least in terms of what's available in English in the US market at this time. It's a puzzle-solving police procedural, that may turn on true love, infidelity, a cover-up of a past crime, jealousy of professional success, bribery, middle-school bullying. From early on, the question isn't, who? or how? (We know both of those answers almost immediately) it's why? It's not a thriller. There's no racing against a clock. Unlike in American and British police procedurals, the investigator, Detective Kaga, appears to have all the time he desires to investigate the motive behind Nonoguchi's murder of Hidaka, a successful author. Nonoguchi isn't likely to skip town. Kaga's supervisor tweaks him gently once over his efforts to understand Nonoguchi’s motive, but he neither reassigns him nor directs him to stop. Note to self, impatient American mystery reader: "Toto, we aren't in Kansas any more."

We have two narrators, one of whom is unreliable and the other the reader believes to be reliable. Malice switches back and forth from one to another, and also includes a section of a dozen or so 3/4 page interviews with a variety of persons who knew the victim and the murderer back in middle school. Each has a distinct voice and perspective, which few authors beside Higashino could pull off.

There's also an element of inside-baseball for writers. One of the core possible explanations for Nonoguchi's motive for murdering Hidaka - one that receives an inordinate amount of Malice's page-count -- is that Hidaka may have taken several completed novel manuscripts penned by Nonoguchi, and used them as the basis for several of his award-winning, NYT bestselling books. If the term, "plagiarism" makes your blood boil, you know who you are, and Malice is the book for you.

On the other hand, I didn't give Malice 4 or 5 stars because it has, to my mind, a glaring flaw. Higashino makes both the victim and the murderer unappealing from the beginning of his novel, and Detective Kaga is a blank slate. That choice is fundamental to his ultimate solution, e.g., the public and the reader (and perhaps even the police) must despise Hidaka and feel nothing or negative emotions for Nonoguchii. When I have time to read, I implicitly make a choice of which world I want at that moment to inhabit, including which characters I want either to know better or to spend time with. With Malice, because of the author's choice, that choice could easily have led to a DNF, had I not been committed to finishing it based on past, good reading experiences with Higashino's works. I made myself keep reading and finish this book, as if finishing it was on my task list, not because I wanted to read it. Higashino didn't make me care "why"? In The Devotion of Suspect X and Salvation of a Saint, the victim was equally unappealing, but either the murderer or the investigator was interesting, or likeable, or fascinating. Not here. Kaga was a polite, smart blank slate. No one was interesting. Plus, there was a dangling fact that never mattered and wasn't a herring of any shade. (view spoiler)[ I spent the entire novel thinking that at some point the relevance of Kaga's and Nonoguchi's having previously been colleagues at the same school would justify the stretched-credulity coincidence of making Kaga and Nonoguchi former colleagues. But it never became relevant, the coincidence was unnecessary, and it's entirely unlike Higashino to include a fact that doesn't matter, otherwise to this Poe-appreciator known as, a mystery-writing error. (view spoiler)[

I recommend this novel to anyone who likes the intellectual challenge of puzzle-solving-oriented mysteries, and appreciates the culture and approach of Japanese mystery authors. But. Malice was written/published 9 years prior to The Devotion of Suspect X. If you've read The Devotion of Suspect X, The Salvation of a Saint or A Midsummer's Equation and are anticipating the same quality reading experience? maybe wait a year or two before picking up Malice and I anticipate you'll enjoy it greatly. For me, Malice was the 4th Higashino novel I've read since January 1 and it is so substantially inferior to the other 3 (although far better than much that is on the market in this space) that I found my interest flagging at approximately page 75, but pushed on through because i still enjoy Higashino's writing -- even when the work doesn't hang together. For someone who hasn't read other HIgashino novels and is intrigued by Japanese culture, Malice likely is a great ride. (hide spoiler)] (hide spoiler)]