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Ok, I have a problem with this book. I don’t know if I hate it or love it. I will try to explain.

Kunihiko Hidaka, a famous novelist has been found dead in his house by his wife and long time friend Osamu Nonoguchi.

The book begins by Nonoguchi’s account. For some reason he has written down that day’s sequence of events. We are told about the victim, his movements on the day of the crime and about his enemies. We are made to understand that the victim was not a good person.

Enter detective Kaga, who interviews Nonoguchi and the victim’s wife and conducts his own investigation and in a very short time finds who the real killer is.

I usually don’t like it when the killer is revealed right at the beginning, but this book was brilliant in the sense that we don’t know what the real motive for the murder is and we keep on not knowing until almost the end. This is truly a game of cat and mouse. But who is the cat and who is the mouse?

I have read several books by Japanese authors and more or less know their style. Less description, more conversation, short sentences, abrupt endings.
You know those detective crime/mystery novels from the early 1900s, in which the detective talks a lot, explaining and re-explaining everything; focusing on the 'method' and 'motive' rather than the 'who'? Well, this book is like that. We already know who the killer is, so the motive shouldn’t be important, but somehow the detective is obsessed with it and so is the reader.
Other than the talkativeness, the twists were very clever and I loved the way the author kept the reader in suspense.