What starts out as an escapade born out of online dating results in the murder of a young woman. This whodunit novel slowly reveals who the suspects are, and they are many despite the obvious ones, the two men she was supposedly dating.
At times the book reads like a classic, going into painful details to set up its theme of a lonely Japan full of lonely people, and dangerous ones. This was essential in its attempt to answer a question which is definitely more than the usual "who is the killer?"
Likewise, it maintains its pacing by shifting the viewpoint from character to character, all of whom share a link to either the dead victim or the murderer on the loose. Often this was effective, but there are characters that I wished could have spoken or appeared more as they were quite interesting enough on their own and with their connection to the main characters. This is more important if we guess at what the novel is trying to say especially since it will become obvious or not who the real villain or villains are.
The exposition of the lives of the victims and the villains is a psycho-social autopsy and investigation going beyond the question of "why?" It gave off some vibes akin to that of Camus' "The Stranger" thus this may not be a good book for those who crave crime novels which feature bizarre characters(killers) and their actions. Nonetheless, it proves that behind what seems as ordinary life, there is something extraordinary.
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